


Unappreciated

by Illusionsofthesoul



Category: Naruto
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-10-01
Updated: 2017-04-29
Packaged: 2018-08-18 22:00:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 39,281
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8177611
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Illusionsofthesoul/pseuds/Illusionsofthesoul
Summary: What am I?That really depends on whose asking. To some I'm just a regular leaf ninja, to some others I'm a friend to depend on, some view me as a medic who will always help others, some would say I'm a host of a very pleasant inn that hosts foreign shinobi when they come to Konoha, some could even view me as someone they'd prefer not to get on the wrong side of (In my dreams that is) .....niece? friend? comrade? medic? shinobi? fighter? helpful? Host?I guess in a way I am all of these things.So when faced with the question of what do I do when I'm faced with these Suna shinobi, one of which being a redhead that may even be thinking of killing me right now? I don't know.Maybe...."It's a pleasure to meet you all. My name is Tsukina Tanaka and I am the owner of this inn. It is my honour to be housing you within the duration of the Chuunin exams. Please make yourselves at home."Yeah....I'm screwed.





	1. Chapter 1 - I always do like the unappreciated ones

**Author's Note:**

> AN - I do not in anyway own Naruto, that right belongs to Masashi Kishimoto.  
> Please enjoy.

Chapter 1 - I always do like the unappreciated ones.  
"Hey...hey Kina wake up."  
Slowly I opened my eyes, the light stinging my eyes as they creaked apart. "Whats going on Shikamaru?" My voice was mumbled, mixed with a yawn that was slowly escaping my lips.  
"How about waking up and seeing for yourself. Geez waking you up is such a drag."  
An amused chuckle escape from me. "You should see me trying to wake you up in the middle of a test."  
The boy next to me, black hair pulled back into a high ponytail was wearing a naturally bored expression with black eyes that I could tell wanted to do nothing but sleep. He smirked, his voice a lazy sort of drawl. "What are you talking about, you're usually asleep yourself next to me."  
I smirked, my green eyes trailing to Shikamaru "I can't argue with that."  
I turned back to face the front of the class which I had fallen asleep in and was alittle surprised.  
"I see Iruka sensei got Naruto back." Truthfully I didn't expect to see the blonde boy that was tied up in ropes at the front of the class.  
"If you were awake 3 minutes ago you would have seen him being dragged in."  
"I know, I know."  
My eyes narrowed as I watched sensei berating the blond kid named Naruto, who looked rather displeased by his situation.  
I sighed and picked up my pen, twirling it around my fingers. After afew moments I placed my pen down and focused my attention again on the centre of the room. Iruka sighed "I'm at the end of my rope Naruto. You failed the graduation test last time and the time before that. Tomorrow you've got another chance and you’re messing up again." Almost as if defiance Naruto turned his head away from Iruka sensei. "Humph!"  
Iruka sensei didn't seem very pleased. "Fine!" Sensei pointed dramatically at Naruto "Because you missed it Naruto, everyone will review the transformation jutsu." Slight irritation spiked through me along with the rest of the class.  
My gaze caught Shikamaru's and we both sighed, "Man, this is such a drag."  
I wanted to chuckle alittle at that. One can really tell how close to someone you are when you can match phrases they say in unison. He sighed once more and we got up along with the rest of the class and made our way to the centre clearing of the classroom. I sat myself on one of the desks within 5 seconds of getting down there next to Shikamaru, Naruto (who had been untied) and a girl named Ino Yamanaka. I watched as another girl with long pink hair came to the centre of the floor after having her name called out of a register by Iruka sensei. Clearly she was to perform the jutsu first.  
"Alright Sakura here"" She announced "Let’s do it." She made the hand sign "Transform." A puff of smoker later and a perfect replica of Iruka sensei was standing in Sakura's place.  
Sensei wrote something down on a clip board "Transformed into me. Good."  
With a puff of smoke she changed back "Yes I did it." she announced congratulating herself, within the seconds she turned to look at a disinterested boy standing in the Que. The moment she saw him she started blushing, "Sasuke, did you see that?"  
Sakura Haruno, a koinichi of the hidden leaf village. She is small, has long pink hair, blue green eyes and wears a red short dress and ninja sandals. Well that’s her appearance anyways, she is teased by my friend Ino alot about her forehead, it is quite wide in comparison to the average persons but personally there are worse things to be teased about. Personality wise she is rather loud and argumentative, quite temperamental too. That I could ignore, but she also does have a rather prominent aspect to her personality. She has an obsessive fangirl nature over one person in particular.  
"Next.... Sasuke Uchiha."  
Sakura disappeared into the que and the object of Sakura's obsessions came forward to stand where she had just been. To be perfectly honest most of the girls in this class were Uchiha fangirls with a small sane minority. As you can probably guess, I am not one of these Uchiha fangirls. I do find Sasuke attractive however, I am still a girl but nothing more than that. I think Shikamaru would kick me out of his house if I was.  
I could emphasize with the boy though, his entire clan was massacred by his older brother. Sasuke was the sole survivor. Mine on the otherhand was a creation of toxic gas through to chemical in paint mixing with something else.. I didn't have the context behind my loss that he did.  
Slowly I shook my head, these thoughts are too morbid for just after lunch. My eyes focused in time to see Sasuke transform from Iruka back into himself. I seem to have missed his transformation. He immediately joined the back of the que, his black eyes surveying the class before moving to looking disinterested again. Sasuke was a rather disinterested person who didn't really think too highly of others, his fangirls included. Pretty arrogant sometimes and he had a cool type of personality. We got on OK, given that he rarely talked to anyone often.  
"Tsukina Tanaka!"  
I felt abit more irritated when my full name was called. "Sensei, I thought you changed my name to Kina on the register."  
Iruka sensei laughed lightly "I can't change your name on the official register Kina." Shrugging I made my way to the front of the class. Breathing out I made the necessary hand signs and focused on the jutsu. With a puff of smoke I also transformed into Iruka Sensei. He looked over the transformation and wrote down onto a clipboard he was carrying.  
"Good job Kina!"  
I breathed out again and released the jutsu before walking over and re-joining Shikamaru and Ino instead of going to the back of the que like I was probably meant to. I re-sat back on the desk and looked over my friends. Naruto was standing next to the other two with his hands in his pockets and was looking rather irritated. And from what I could hear the others weren't helping.  
"This is a total waste of time Naruto." Shikamaru complained stuffing his hands in his pockets too.  
"Yeh" Ino agreed "We always pay for your screw ups."  
"Next, Naruto Uzumaki"  
Naruto humped and began to walk forward "Like I care." He groaned.  
I lifted my hand up in a small sort of wave hoping not to make Naruto feel too bad "I don't mind Naruto." I told him cheerfully "Just so long as you put on a show and make it worth my time."  
Almost immediately he turned back with a small grin "Oh I will." Mission accomplished.  
As Naruto stood in the centre of the room and made the hand signs Ino turned to me. "Did you really feel the need to say that to someone like him?"  
I turned to her and smiled. "I always do like the unappreciated ones Ino. Underdogs are my type. Besides I'm overly friendly."  
Many people in this village (the hidden Leaf village situated in the land of Fire in case you haven't guessed) didn't like the optimistic, innocent, good intentioned blonde boy called Naruto Uzumaki who went around making trouble in a bright orange and blue track suit. I didn't understand why though, everyone treated him like crap and for no apparent reason.  
At first I had been wary and scared of him too because whenever I encountered him people looked down on me and tried to keep me away from him. All those years ago I had assumed there was a reason why. But now that I was abit older I could see that despite causing some trouble and few small pranks he hadn't actually done anything to merit the constant hate. It confused me, the way people treated him so I decided to be someone different to him. Like someone who actually cares. The callings of 'Brat', 'Waste of space', and 'monster' he experienced on a daily basis were cruel and in my eyes uncalled for. Ino unlike some did not mean to be as cruel as many of the adults, but I also knew that deep down there was that uneasiness about him which had almost been imbedded in our minds since we were born that she and many in our class still had. Even if some of us tried to hide it, because we knew that being around Naruto, it was obvious that his reputation wasn't all he was.  
Yes I have sympathy for the boy, but wouldn't you?  
"Transform"  
A large amount of blue chakra began to emit and swirl around Naruto and with a poof he transformed. But what he transformed into was.....  
Okay, admittedly I did tell him to put on a show and make this worth my time but....  
Many jaws dropped and many palms were slapped to faces. Standing where Naruto had been was a beautiful naked girl, with long blonde hair tied into pigtails and was giggling. My jaw dropped however as I watched sensei fly backwards with blood streaming from his nose. Disgusting. With another poof, Naruto changed back into himself and was pointing at Iruka sensei and laughing. Many of the other students in the class were laughing too.  
"Gotcha!" Naruto announced amongst fits of laughter "That’s my sexy jutsu."  
Not being able to help myself I started laughing aswell. Iruka sensei on the otherhand didn't look too pleased "All right!" he yelled at Naruto having composed himself "Cut the stupid tricks, this is your last warning!" Naruto on the otherhand didn't seem to care. I watched sensei's eyes narrow before turning to the rest of us "The rest of you can all go home early, but be sure to practice for the exam." The aura of the room suddenly became alot more buzzed, I sat up straighter too. I could tell this wasn't going to end well for Naruto. "Naruto Uzumaki on the otherhand is going to come with me, for a detention." He groaned as Iruka placed a hand on his shoulder and began to lead him out the classroom door, all our eyes following him. "I'll see you all tomorrow." With that the door shut behind the two of them leaving a slightly surprised class in their wake.  
"Alright!" Ino cheered turning to face me "We get to go home early, wanna come round to my house, we could even go to the bath house later since we'll have some free time."  
I glanced at Shikamaru asking for permission and he sighed, "Just go with Ino, I'll tell my mum you'll be back for dinner. So long as you’re back before your curfew she won't mind....well my dad certainly won't at least."  
Ino giggled and clasped my hands with her own. "It's synched then."  
I smiled at her before turning my head to Shikamaru. "Thanks Shikamaru, tell Yoshino I'll pick up some more of that soap she likes from the bathhouse as compensation for not giving her advanced warning of going to Ino's."  
"Sure sure, just don't spoil your appetite, she'll get really angry if you ruin your meal."  
I nodded and hopped off the table, noticing the rest of the students were beginning to disperse. "You have anything you need to get?" I asked them both to receive nods. Within a minute or so we had exited the building. "See you at 7 Shikamaru." I waved as the 3 of us split up.  
"Yeh Yeh." He drawled sauntering off in the other direction.  
Ino giggled again "Watching you both is so funny, you might as well be related."  
"Yeh, we might as well be." A strip of dark blue, and white caught my eye and I gave out a sly grin. I knew what to do now. "Hey Ino, look 5 o'clock." As she moved her eyes she broke out in a fangirl grin. Smirking I placed a hand on her shoulder, "Wanna play the stalking game?" She nodded eagerly, suddenly not saying a word. Let’s just say last time we played this we got caught due to her constant chattering about the object of our stalking. Nice to know she had learnt from our past mistakes. "How about we both try to get as close as we can without being spotted. Having Sasuke glance at the place we're hiding counts, if that happens we give up and go home, Agreed." I laid out the terms as if I was going over the rules for a real ninja mission. "Understand?" My partner in crime nodded. "Let’s go."  
Quietly we both ran after Sasuke ducking behind many different people and buildings and objects that made up the village, grinning all the while. As we ducked and weaved I noticed that we'd both improved at this. Yes, we have done this before, however sometimes we stalk Sakura or Ino's parents or Shikamaru, Sasuke isn't our only victim, but he is Ino's most preferred one. before we couldn't get within 16 meters of Sasuke even in the middle of town without getting caught. We were too obvious, either we tripped on something, didn't hide properly or were too loud. Now we were within 10 meters of Sasuke. Our creepy training methods are paying off. I took 3 more steps before ducking behind a bench, feeling the rough dirt of the ground on my bare knees. I watched Ino move from behind a man standing at a street vender to the doorway of a grocery shop. Suddenly she looked toward me and her grin faltered, being replaced with horror instead.  
"What?" I mouthed silently to her in confusion but instead of replying she turned to look to my left.  
'Oh shit! Don't tell me....'  
"What on earth are you two idiots doing?"  
I slowly turned my head to the left wearing my classic 'Oh shit!' expression. Standing up I took in the boy standing before me. Sasuke Uchiha was watching me with mild disinterested in his black eyes which were framed by his black hair. He was standing like usual with his hands in the pockets of his white shorts. His dark blue short sleeved shirt bringing out a slight blue tint to his hair. I could feel my stomach twisting. We. Got. Caught.  
"Hey...Sasuke…Fancy seeing you here." I gave a small wave but even an outsider could tell it was forced and nervous.  
"What are you both doing, following me?"  
"I think you just said it yourself, following you." I laughed nervously, scratching the back of my head slowly. "We were training. Trying to see if our skills in spying..... Espionage have improved."  
"Huhm." It was obvious he was skeptical but I was only half joking. Our skills had improved, "Your following of me is pathetic, how long are you going to keep it up?"  
"Probably until our skills have improved enough to follow people effectively." I replied with feigned confidence, looking him in the eyes and trying not to waver, he could be intimidating at times. I'm not stupid enough to ignore that fact.  
He sighed before turning back the way he had been going before "Well at least cover your head with a scarf or something next time Kina. Your red hair draws attention to your position."  
He walked away. I let out a breath and before I knew it Ino came up to me. "What did Sasuke say? Was he angry?" She asked lightly glancing at the Uchiha's retreating back, a light blush over her pale features.  
I shook my head "Probably just irritated. He did tell me to cover my red hair next time, so I guess he doesn't mind as much as he'd like us to believe."  
She smiled at my reply. "At least he's inviting me to follow him next time."  
I sighed. Her crush with him was as obsessive as Sakura's. I stretched "Let’s head to yours. I believe you promised me last time to teach me how to make a proper flower display."  
"Oh yeh, yours sucked!"  
"Shut up Ino."  
\--+--  
"Ahhhhhhhhhh this is the stuff." I yawned as I let myself sink into the steamy hot water, it submerging me up to my chin. I breathed out a long tired breath.  
"You do love your baths Kina. I'm surprised you’re not a prune." My friend stretched out herself let the water embrace her too. Her long blonde hair was tied up in a bun atop her head. Her pale blue eyes were closed as she relaxed in the water. "But I can see why you come here so often."  
I nodded in agreement. I came to the bath houses at least once a week, but I bathed at home every night. I wasn't a shower person, I believed it was important to appreciate the times in a day where one can relax and just drift away. "It's always much nicer bathing with another person so that you have someone to talk to. Unfortunately Shikamaru's a guy so that scores him of the list of candidates." I admitted running my fingers over the top of the water.  
"Your finally getting better at your flower arranging though, this one was actually pretty good. You just need to try and not choose colours that blend together too much for the piece you were practicing." I nodded as I took her advice in. Ino's family owned the Yamanaka flower shop in the hidden leaf village, so naturally Ino was a master when it came to flower arranging. Her family also worked in interrogation with their clan’s secret jutsu. It was quite amazing their technique. Although still being in the academy Ino had yet to properly master it.  
We soaked for a while, just chatting about all the mindless things girls our age did, even about boys but eventually I could feel my skin begin to wrinkle.  
"Hey, Kina!"  
"Yeh?"  
"What time are you meant to be back at Shikamaru's?"  
"7, why?"  
Ino gave a kind of nervous smile. "Well its 6:35 and we still have to get changed."  
I could feel my eye twitch as I turned my head to face the clock on the wall behind me. You ask why there’s a clock. I put one in here (with the permission of the owner of course) for situations such as this one. And sure enough the time wasn't in fact 6:35 but 6:37, which was even worse. "Rats!" I exclaimed quickly turning my body and pulling myself out of the water. I could hear Ino do the same. We still had to get dry too, and get home, and get the soap I said I'd get. Shit. I wrapped a towel around my body and belted into the next room, wasting no time to start trying to remove the droplets of water from my body. The towel scraped roughly against my body, leaving it a darker kind of pink but I didn't care. I hated running late. Within 5 minutes I was dry and changed. Making sure I had to money I looked to Ino who still wasn't quite done yet.  
"I'm going to run to the shop at the front to buy some soap, meet me there?" I announced stopping infront of a mirror.  
I saw her nod in the reflection as I gave myself a once over. Blue ninja sandals which reached up my shins to give me better ankle support were zipped up and on the right feet (they're practically boots but the foot bit looks like a sandal). My shorts were grey and worn with a red fabric belt. The boarders of the legs of the shorts were a light sand/beige colour. Thankfully they weren't inside out this time. I wore a red fishnet vest top under a loose grey top. The collar and sleeves all had the same boarder as the shorts. One long sleeve and one short one, surprisingly I had not put it on back to front this time either.  
My red hair was damp, but there wasn't anything I could do about that now, unless there was some kind of hair drying jutsu I don't know of (how convenient would that be). My hair grew oddly, the ends came round my neck and encircled it, almost like pincers on a crab or something. Average fringe. But it was the colour that identified me as a member of the Tanaka clan of the hidden leaf. I liked the red, it was different; the roots of my hair were slightly darker than the tips of the hair pincers (for lack of a better name) and was my most defining feature.  
Shaking my head I realized I had gotten absorbed in checking to make sure I was properly dressed and ran out of the girl’s dressing room. About 20 seconds of corridor later I had reached the little shop that was present in one of the wings of the bathhouse’s reception.  
The owner smiled at me as I arrived, panting slightly.  
"I trust that you enjoyed your bath miss Kina."  
She was an elderly lady, around 60-70 years old with grey hair tied up in a slightly messy bun, and was wearing a light green robe with a white leaf print on it. She had a 40 year old daughter who was pregnant again who helped her run the bathhouse. But Ino and I hadn't seen her today. She might be with her own daughter, a kind girl of 12.  
"Yes I did Mrs. Hamada. Do you have any of that willow and plum soap in stock, I would like to purchase some for Mrs. Nara."  
I scanned around the shelves behind her and to the side of reception looking for the familiar lilac and pale green wrappings.  
"Yes, we do, just hold on a moment and I'll go and get it for you." I felt that light headed relief wash over me upon having these words reach me. At least even if I was late I would have a peace offering. "Here you go Miss Kina." The recognized square package was placed on the desk, tied with a straw imitating ribbon. Reaching into my pocket and pulling out some money I counted out the normal 20 ryo with the extra 10 ryo tip I gave every time I was here. I placed the money on the counter and picked up the soap. I loved this paper, it was really soft.  
"Thank you Mrs. Hamada, see you soon." I could tell she was giving me a silent wave as I turned my back, she did it to every customer that walked into this building. Upon turning round I saw Ino leaning against the doorframe clearly waiting for me. Her long blonde hair was tied up in a bun for once given that it was still rather damp.  
"Took you long enough Kina."  
I pouted slightly. "I thought that was a pretty fast exchange all things considered."  
"You do realize its 6:50, right?"  
That impulse one occasionally gets when they realize how little time they have left to do something. "I do now." Both of us immediately started belting it out of the bathhouse and the way which we knew the Nara house was, while at the same time shouting a quick goodbye to Mrs. Hamada. It was only as I was running did I realize how long it had been since I had last done so. The burning feeling which I knew was lactic acid in my legs was slightly strange to me, a clear sign that I needed to be training harder and much more frequently than I have been. It almost made me want to laugh.  
"Hey Kina." I looked to my left to see Ino, running a step or so behind me. "When was the last time you did cardio, well running specifically?"  
I grimaced. "A while ago."  
"Just cos you seem abit wheezy there." It was one of those joke smiles that she gave me but it still made my grimace deepen.  
"Shut u....."  
I trailed off and stopped dead. Ino realizing this and stopping afew steps ahead of me.  
"Hey why'd you st......" She trailed off in mid-sentence too, probably realizing just where we were. Feelings of longing, mixed with pain and disgust filled me as I let my eyes rest on the building before them. Ino gave me a subtle sad look. I could be doing anything but I would always stop when I reached the pathway stretching to the front door of the Tanaka family home.  
It may or may not be pretty obvious but I don't live there anymore. I haven't lived there for 6 years, a long time I'm sure you'll agree. I now lived with Shikamaru Nara and his parents who graciously took me in after my family in the leaf died. It made me uneasy being there as everywhere I looked in the building, traces of them were everywhere.  
A stone path branched out from the main road slightly on the outskirts of town and stretched for about 30 meters before meeting the foundation of the large (surprisingly large) house. I sighed and turned away from the memory, meeting Ino's gaze. "Sorry, let’s hurry." And just like that we continued. All my friends didn't question this anymore, like I said this happened every time I passed my old home. About 20 seconds of running, turning streets and Ino probably getting dust in her toes from wearing sandals she spoke.  
"I don't want to sound rude Kina...."  
"Just say it anyway." I urged, usually having people beating around the bush irritated me, there were afew exceptions though, like Hinata Hyuuga.  
"Your family was quite small right, well for the size of your Clan's house right, so why is it so big." I stayed silent for a moment or two, only speaking when finally we had arrived outside the Nara household. Yoshino wasn't standing outside waiting for me so I knew I somehow wasn't late. I looked towards Shikamaru's house as I began to explain.  
"You know how your clan owns a flower shop but also are experts at intelligence gathering, espionage and interrogation." Ino nodded.  
"before my mother married into the Tanaka clan her family had their own village specialty." I smiled as I remembered my mum explaining this to me back when I was too young to properly understand. "She liked to call it the role of leaf hospitality. Essentially one of her main roles was to assign living space and host foreign shinobi and well, people in general when they visited the leaf. One example would be during the Chuunin exams when people from all over would come to the leaf village and needed a place to stay, There were the normal rooms we kept in the centre of the village for civilians and then for shinobi she hosted them in her own home, which was actually more like an inn. When she married my father they decided to rebuild the Tanaka house so that she could continue her role of the allocation and hosting of visitors to the village. So essentially we have an inn in our house as strange as that sounds."  
Ino's eyes widened "That’s awesome, so she kept track of where every visitor to the leaf was staying?"  
"Yes." I told her as I closed my eyes "Her aim was to promote the village through her hospitality. But her family was incharge of more than that. They did that on a much large scale. For the whole hidden leaf village."  
"The whole village?"  
"It was their job to keep record of where everyone was staying, what buildings were empty, what buildings were in construction and so on. Basically if you wanted to move house then you had to liaise with them because they were the ones that would officially move you. One day I wish to pick up all the roles my family held within the village and to give help and give people a place they feel they can be at home and belong." I opened my eyes and turned back to face her. "You may dream to one day marry Sasuke or something and Naruto Uzumaki may dream to become Hokage, but that is my dream, to prove myself as Tsukina Tanaka and give people a place they feel they belong, a home, friends, love whatever they want. Whatever they need."


	2. Kiss Ass

Chapter 2 - Kiss Ass  
“Thank you for the soap Kina, but please try not to do any after school activities without warning me in the future.”  
I bowed my head to Shikamaru's mother as a sign of acceptance of her will and respect. “Yes Yoshino, I shall try to be less spontaneous in the future.” I said and walked over to the table in the Nara's dining room before sitting down next to Shikamaru and opposite Shikaku, Shikamaru's father. Shikamaru leaned into me to whisper in my ear as I sat down “Kiss ass.”  
I shrugged “It's useful, you should do it someday. Maybe you'll get something you want easier.”  
“Nah, it's such a drag.” I smirked and he leaned back over to he was sitting properly in his chair once more. As he did so we noticed Shikaku watching us.  
“Anything you two wish to share with the class or will it be too much of a drag?”  
Shikamaru and I looked at each other before turning back to his father. “A drag.” we both said with further conversation being interrupted by Yoshino placing the first dish for dinner on the table.  
“Would you care for some assistance Yoshino?” I called from my seat.  
"No thanks, you’re on clean up tonight anyway.” I nodded even though she couldn't see me. I may be a permanent guest at the Nara house but it didn't mean I was okay with everything being done for me, I wanted to help out where I could. Besides if I helped around the house then it meant that Shikamaru had more free time, and since he was the one who had to put up with me the most it balanced out. I could tell that Shikamaru was wanted to sneak another 'kiss ass' comment to me but as Yoshino brought out the rest of the dinner any inkling was extinguished.  
Yoshino was very kind and accepting but she could also be quite harsh and strict. I liked that. Shikamaru on the other-hand didn't like that so much. Yoshino sat down and we all took that as the time to reach for food and pile it on our plates. As I helped myself to a rather large spoon of rice Yoshino gave me a condescending look. “Just remember Kina that you’re not leaving this table until you eat every scrap of food. I will not have food waste in this house.” She said and I nodded.  
“I know, I'm just very hungry tonight.” I said smiling as I placed some rice into my mouth and chewed it. Shikamaru smirked at my slight reprimand and his mother turned on him this time.  
“You too, Shikamaru. You’re not to waste any food either.” It was Shikaku's and my turn to smirk this time. Of course in no time at all Yoshino turned to her husband. “Don't think you can leave any food either. You’re not a child.” I giggled alittle at the exchange between the Nara's and myself. I enjoyed nights like these and cherished them.

(--+-- Timeskip --+--)

""So you all done in the kitchen with the clean up?”  
As I ascended the stairs, my hand placed on the cool wooden rail that was attached securely to the stairs I looked up to see Shikamaru sitting on the top step. I hadn't noticed him so it was proof that my skills were nowhere near as good as a soon-to-be-ninja's should be. “Yep, all spick and span.” I said giving a mock salute. “So what do you want to do now?” He stood up and began to walk along one of the corridors. I followed hearing him speak.  
“Geez, chores are such a drag.”  
“Yep.” I said again “As you tell me every night. If I had 1 ryo for every time you said that to me I'd be rich.”  
“You already are.”  
I narrowed my eyes at Shikamaru's back as he entered his room, me following in soon after. “You know as well as I do that I can't touch that money until after I take on my families roles within the village.” He walked across with his hands in his pockets to his bed on the far left side of the room and lay on it, face up to the ceiling with his eyes shut.  
“And when do you actually plan on doing that, you talk about it a lot so I'd think you'd at least have some idea of when you'd take on this responsibility.” It was just a casual statement but I could tell it was meant partly as a question, and it took me alittle by surprise. Usually he wouldn't ask like this. As I mulled it over in my head I lay down, back sprawled against Shikamaru's mattress next to him.  
“Soon I think. I was thinking that I would try and take on 2 of the roles when we get put into teams and practice proper ninja training. Seeing as we graduate tomorrow it would have been pointless trying to plan anything before now.”  
“All that responsibility, it'll be such a drag. Never mind the endless patients with your medical jutsu.”  
“Yeh.” I used remembering how stressed my mum would sometimes get when trying to relocate and organize large numbers of people. 'Tending to the masses' was what she called it sometime. It made me and my sister laugh anyway. My aunt sitting down with endless patients who requested her and giving them personalized 1-2-1 long term healing and recovery would also result in a lack of sleep for her."  
As if reading my mind Shikamaru spoke again “Have you heard from you aunt recently. It's been a while since her last letter."  
I shook my head as I thought of her fondly “One should arrive within the next few days, along with my allowance for the next couple of weeks, she got a sudden increase in recovery patients after a building collapsed in Kumogakure. So I don't blame her, besides her and her husband should have more important things to worry about than me.”  
I shut my eyes as I told him this.  
“An aunt living all the way in the cloud village, what a drag.”  
“Yeh. She's only allowed to live with her husband there because of an attempt at promoting positive relations between the two villages.” I said again and turned over on my side slightly, making my arm into a pillow. It wasn't as conformable as a real one but was still more comfortable than a desk or something. We lay there in comfortable silence before I felt something prod at my cheek. The sensation wasn't painful though just mildly irritating.  
“Hey, Kina don't fall asleep on my bed again like you did last week, moving you was such a drag.” Shikamaru complained as I purposely refused to open one of my eyes.  
“You only moved me to a different part of the bed, you still slept in it, besides the bed would have been warmer with me next to you anyways Shika.”  
“We're too old to get away with stuff like that anymore. If you have a nightmare or something fair enough but it just doesn't work anymore, besides don't call me 'Shika'. I sighed seeing his point and opened my eyes seeing Shikamaru sitting up next to me. “If you want to sleep, do it in your own bed. You have a whole room to yourself here.”  
“Fine.” groaned and sat up, wearily pulling myself up from his bed. I didn't notice when I had gotten so tired. Must have happened while I was cleaning or something. I dragged myself towards the door, murmuring a quick 'good-night' before heading across to my own room, the one next to his. As I walked in I took a quick glance around. The walls were plain but I had several throws and posters hanging from them to make it look more lived in and to try and preserve heat in the winter. A rug covered the centre of the room with a single bed on the far left like in Shika's room. A chest of drawers was lined up against the walls and had several medical books resting upon it along with some other junk that belonged to me. A desk lay alittle way away from it which was cluttered with stuff. And I knew there would be some articles of clothing lying around somewhere too.  
It was funny, I wanted to take on the role of organizing the homes and property of every person in Konoha but I could barely keep a lid on my own room.  
I would need to work on that sometime....well tomorrow at least. As I let out a yawn I located my pyjamas. I didn't need to turn on the lights for that. Within the minute I was out of my normal day clothes and into my night ones. Taking one last look around my dark room I climbed into my bed that housed about 3 additional blankets along with my duvet and about 8 pillows. I kept collecting things to add to my bed all the time.  
Pulling my covers up and over my head, pushing the blankets down to the foot of the bed, their fleecy nature enveloping my feet like well a blanket for lack of a better comparison. I snuggled my face into one of my medium sized pillows.  
'I hope the graduation exam goes well for everyone tomorrow.' I thought to myself before being out within moments.


	3. Chapter 3 - Squad 8?

"You did what?!" I exclaimed loudly slamming my hands down on the desk which lay before me. Naruto the idiot I was questioning wasn't looking guilty or anything of the sort but was instead smiling giddily at me as he lay his head on his hands on the table were my hands rested. "I can't believe you were stupid enough to steal that scroll. Do you have any idea how worried I was when I woke up to hear what you had done?"  
Naruto laughed slightly, "Sorry. But I'm a ninja now so everything turned out ok. Believe it!"  
I sighed as Shikamaru walked up next to the two of us "Fine. I'll believe it." I muttered and poked his new headband to emphasize his point.  
"Hey, watch it Kina. I don't wanna get it dirty." He exclaimed rubbing it with his sleeve to remove any trace of my finger. It was at this moment that Shikamaru decided to join in our conversation. Well more like interrupt it.  
"What are you doing here Naruto? This place isn't for drop outs, you can't be here unless you graduated." I sighed and sat down on to table behind me as there was no-one sitting right at the end of the aisle, two other guys sat and spoke alittle way along.  
Naruto glared at him and sat up pointing at his own headband, tied around his head with a blue sash. "Oh yeh." He defended "Do you see this, you see this. Open your eyes Shikamaru it's a regulation headband. We're going to be training together. How do you like that?"  
Shikamaru huffed. It wasn't like he disliked Naruto like most others, he did like him. He just found Naruto to be abit dim and slow sometimes. Well compared to him anyway. "Let me put it to you this way. I look great in this head gear, like it was made for me. Believe it!"  
Shikamaru just shook his head, his own head band was also sporting a blue sash with the metal plate engraved with the leaf village insignia like Naruto's, but instead his was wrapped around his left arm. Mine on the otherhand was tied with the red sash I used as a belt around my waist. It wouldn't have looked very good on my forehead like most other people's. Trust me I tried, Ino laughed at me for a good 5 minutes when I was trying to figure out how to wear it. But in the end like her I decided to wear it around my waist.  
'Speaking of which. Where is she? Ino's not usually the late type.'  
But it was the sound of the classroom door opening loudly and the even louder cries of "I'm first!" announced her and most likely the reason for her lateness’s arrival. I turned back and sure enough Ino and Sakura Haruno were standing in the doorway panting. My guesses were they had raced each other here. And listening to their gloating at each other I also guessed I was right.  
I shook my head and Shikamaru walked away, probably to go speak to Choji, a friend of ours, or to go take a nap. Both were highly likely. I waved a quickly goodbye to Naruto and went to join him, nodding a quickly 'hello' to Sasuke Uchiha as we made eye contact on the way past, he was sitting at the other end of the table to Naruto, refusing to interact with everyone else....but then again that was normal for him.  
I narrowly lost against the urge to trip Sakura as she passed me on the stairs. Watching her push Naruto out the way and onto the floor as I sat down next to Shikamaru made me really wish I had done it.  
You may be wondering why I seem to have such a spite against Sakura Haruno. Yes I do have one I admit that.   
It's because when all of us were younger she developed a crush on Sasuke, the thing was Ino already liked Sasuke, upon finding this out Sakura broke up her and Ino's friendship. I know I wouldn't have had that much of a problem with that if it hadn't been for the fact that Ino was Sakura's first real friend and that Ino had stood up for Sakura when she was bullied. I never quite understood their obsessive attraction to Sasuke but for the most part I could accept it. It was just that when this all happened it was in the aftermath of the deaths of my own family, I remember hurting even more upon seeing Ino's pain at losing a friend combined with the pain of my own loss. You can think my reasoning is lame I don't really care, but when something like that sticks in the back of your mind, it's hard not to base your opinions of someone on it.  
Something was said by Sakura which seemed to draw a large number of the girls in the class around her, arguing with her and Ino. During this time to my surprise Naruto decided to get up from where he had been knocked to the floor and crouched on the desk, glaring right up in Sasuke's face much to Sakura and most of the rest of the girls in the classes’ chagrin.  
Given the new commotion Shikamaru and I caught glances and sighed. "Just promise me you won't ever be like that. Putting up with you as you are now is enough of a drag."  
I shook my head again "Not likely, are there even any guys out there which are good enough to be that obsessive about?" I received a strange look at that.  
"How should I know? I'm a guy." He replied tiredly. I shrugged and wondered if I could get any food off Chouji later. In the middle of my thoughts I noticed the room get eerily quiet, it was kind of weird. Looking towards the only possible source of such strangeness I caught sight of Naruto and Sasuke.  
I felt myself choke alittle in both amusement and disgust.  
Sasuke and Naruto were in lip lock of tug of war, lips smashed up against each other in obvious repulsion from both of them. To be frank they were kissing. Shock overwhelmed me which for once put me in the same mind as the rest of all the girls in the class, or more accurately the mind of them entire class itself. Several tense seconds passed in shock and awkwardness before the two of them finally broke the kiss. Not being able to help myself anymore I burst out laughing, partly at Sakura's over reaction to the whole ordeal and partly due to the actions of Naruto and Sasuke who started coughing and choking, glaring at each other with every half breath.   
After several moments Shikamaru placed a hand on my shoulder, "Don't you think you’re over doing it Kina?"  
I shook my head but did stop laughing, "Do you think they are?" I pointed down to the group of girls who had been arguing over sitting next to Sasuke, if Naruto had any sense in him he would run given the death looks all the girls were sending him....but given how clueless he could be sometimes he didn't run he tried to defend himself instead. Only when Sakura declared him dead did he finally run. The next few moments were taken up of Naruto being chased around the room by the rabid fangirls occasionally one of them would land a punch or kick on him while Shikamaru and I watched.  
Within afew minutes however Iruka sensei walked in and thankfully for Naruto the commotion died down and everyone returned to their seats. Sakura stole a seat next to Sasuke who didn't really seem to care while Naruto resumed his original seat next to her. Ino on the otherhand sat on the right side of Shikamaru since there wasn't any space next to me on my left.  
Thankful for the lack of commotion I rested my head on my hands, playing with one of the strands of my pincer like hair. Soon enough once we all quieted down completely Iruka sensei addressed the class.  
"As of today you are all ninjas. To get here you faced difficult trials and hardships. But that’s nothing, what comes next will be far more difficult. Now you are only Genin, first level ninjas, all the Genin will be grouped into 3 man squads and a single 4 man squad due to numbers of graduates this year, each squad will be led by a Jounin, an elite ninja." He explained, At these words I noticed Ino perk up out of the corner of my eye, I was guessing she was thinking about ending up on Sasuke's team she started talking to Sakura to it was probably right again. I too was thinking about teams but mainly if I would somehow end up on Shikamaru or Ino's team. As I was thinking I realized that apart from Sakura who I feel that I'd clash with too much given my friendship with Ino, there wasn't actually anyone in the class I wouldn't want to get grouped with......well that’s convenient.  
Sensei began speaking again so I paid attention to that instead of my own thoughts, "We want each squad to have a balance of strengths and abilities so that’s how set them up."  
I nodded, it made sense for the powers at be to set the squads up that way. "I will now announce the squads."  
Everyone seemed to sit up straighter at those words even Shikamaru, although he still did look bored. Everyone listened for their names. About 4 minutes later my name had still not been called out, however the first 6 squads had been called.  
"Now, squad 7. Naruto Uzumaki, Sakura Haruno....." At this Naruto stared cheering and Sakura's head hit the desk, I could swear I heard her say 'I'm doomed' but it wasn't very clear. "....and Sasuke Uchiha!" This time the actions were reversed and Sakura was the one cheering.  
before anyone else could say anything Sensei resumed squad listing, "And now for the 4 man squad." Those who had not been called, including me sat up abit straighter. "Hinata Hyuuga, Kiba Inuzuka, Tsukina Tanaka, and Shino Aburame."  
I smiled and looked around the classroom for my new teammates, I was glad with my new squad. Shino I didn't know very well but the other two, Hinata and Kiba I got on quite well with. This was going to be good. I paused as I realized I'd missed squad 9's calling. I looked over to my left and saw Shikamaru speaking with Ino. It was actually a rather similar conversation to the one that we had been having earlier.  
"You are so beyond clueless Shikamaru, don't you get it?" Ino told him to which he sighed.  
"No I don't get it, cause I'm not a girl." Shikamaru droned leaning his head on his hand.  
"You are so full of yourself. Jealously is a terrible thing. I'd hate to be on your squad." She said matter of factly as sensei resumed speaking.  
"And finally, squad 10. Ino Yamanaka, Shikamaru Nara..." I hid my laughing behind my hand especially given what Ino had just said whereas Shikamaru didn't bother trying to hide is amusement.  
"Did you say something about hating to be on my squad?" I withdrew my hand but stopped laughing as Ino glared at Shikamaru out of the corner of her eye.  
"...and Chouji Akamichi."  
Ino gripped the sides of her head and groaned. "It could be worse Ino." I told her leaning across Shikamaru "You could be on the same squad as Sakura and some guy you don't like." She just groaned again and I leaned back to my seat, out of Shikamaru's way.  
"Those are all the squads."  
As sensei said this Naruto stood up and began chattering about Sasuke, stuff was said and the class laughed. Meanwhile I turned to Shikamaru. "What do you think of your squad?"  
He groaned "It's a drag."  
I shook my head "Well it could have been worse."  
"Maybe. I'm wondering what my parents will think. Geez having to hear their opinions will be such a drag." He said and I sighed, there really wasn't any more I could do.  
Iruka coughed to get everyones attention to we stopped talking, "After lunch you'll meet your new Jounin teachers. Until then class dismissed." He left and it was like a wave rushed over the class, everyone stared chatting.  
I stretched, feeling the movement deep down in my muscles. "Sooooo, Shika. Wanna see if Chouji has any food he'll give me and take our lunch time nap. This was tiring."  
I could hear Ino laugh at my nickname for Shikamaru while he groaned, "I told you never to call be by that, it's such a drag. And my mum already made us a riceball each for lunch. She doesn't want you to ruin your appetite for dinner, she can be scary you know that."  
I shuddered slightly as I remembered one of the times I accidentally crossed Yoshino, that did not turn out well. "It would only be one extra riceball or so, besides I always eat all my dinner!"  
He sighed, "It's not like I could stop you either way. But a nap does sound good."  
"Yeh."  
Ino shook her head at us and stood up. "You too are so lazy. I can't believe you’re on my team Shikamaru."  
"I can. I heard Iruka sensei call the list of squads." He said back and I laughed.  
Any further banter was interrupted by the presence of one of my new squad members. "Yes Hinata. Is there something you need?" I said noticing her standing behind Ino. As all 3 of us turned to face her, her face turned red at the sudden attention.  
"I...I...uh...was wondering if Kina...would join us...for lunch.....since we're in the same....squad."  
Hinata stuttered alot, she was rather shy so she found speaking to people abit daunting. But as I took in her words they made sense. She pointed over to Kiba and Shino, they were both standing next to desk at the front. Since all of us were all now on the same squad it was logical for us to spend the lunch time getting to know each other before meeting our new sensei. I reached under my desk and pulled out my lunch box before standing up and waving goodbye to Shikamaru and Ino, "I'd recommend you guys do the same with Chouji. It'll be useful I guess."   
"Geez, what a drag." I finished waving as Shikamaru and Ino stood up too. Hinata turned to me timidly.  
"It's...nice that we're team mates Kina. I was worried that...that I'd be the only girl."  
I nodded to her and reached out a hand. Cautiously she took it. "And I'm glad that you’re on my squad too. It will be nice to get to know you even better." Hinata turned away and I laughed. "Shall we go?" I didn't wait for an answer before pulling her down the steps with me and my lunch.  
Hinata dressed in a way that seemed to suggest that she wasn't very self-confident. Her clothes consisted of dark blue 3/4 length bottoms, she also wore a light brown jacket with a ring of white fur at the bottom edge of the jacket. She also had dark blue hair, cut short with 2 long strands framing the side of her face. Her eyes were trademark of the Hyuuga clan, a beautiful silver colour. In all Hinata was quite pretty, but it was subtle. I quite liked it. She was also quite quiet and spoke with a stutter often. Her voice was soft also.  
Soon enough we reached the bottom of the stairs and I pulled her over to where our two other squad mates where.  
"About Damn time, you two. So where do you want to eat?" Kiba said irritably when we both stopped moving. I shrugged and let go of Hinata's hand.  
"I don't care. Wherever." I said truthfully and he nodded. Pointing to the door.  
"Let’s go then!"  
"Once second!" I interrupted and turned to Chouji, Ino and Shikamaru had come down to his desk and were speaking with him. "Chouji!" I called out and he looked over to me, "You owe me food." He seemed to glare at me a moment before smiling and reaching under his desk. He pulled out a wrapped up riceball and threw it to me. I caught it, the fabric smooth against my fingers. "Thanks!" I called out and placed it in my pocket next to the one that Yoshino had made for me. Turning back to Kiba, Hinata, Shino and I followed him out the door and went to find somewhere to eat.

\--+-- (Timeskip) --+--

"So what do you think our new sensei's going to be like?" I asked taking a bite of Yoshino's riceball.  
'Yum, smoked salmon, my favourite.'  
Kiba naturally was the one to answer first. Kiba was a rather wild individual, he was aggressive and impulsive alot of the time. From what I could tell he was loyal too. He was a member of Konoha's Inuzuka clan. He had sharp canine teeth, with black eyes and spiky brown hair. He also had red marks on both of his cheeks that resembled fangs. He wore greyish 3/4 length trousers and a large blueish jacket with a fur collar and furry sleeves. He also had a small white dog named Akamaru who went with him everywhere. I couldn’t remember the last time I saw them apart. Akamaru was currently sitting on Kiba's head. "I don't know. But I hope they'll be really powerful and can train us to win every fight we want!"  
He took a bite of his riceball rather forcefully, showing his aggressive nature.  
I turned to Shino, "What about you, have any ideas?"  
Shino Aburame was a member of the Aburame clan. They were silent and mysterious much like Shino was. He wore black lensed glasses and wore a light coloured jacket that covered a decent fraction of his face. Shino liked bugs and insects. They were part of a clan specialty as the Aburame clan used bugs and insects when they fought. I waited for a response from Shino but he didn't give any. He just turned to look at me and then resumed eating. I sweat dropped. "Thanks for your input." I said mockingly and turned to Hinata, "What about you?"  
"I...think...I want a sensei that’s helpful and kind. Someone strong too." She said and I nodded, finishing up my first riceball and pulling out the second one. I took a drink of a cup of water I'd brought with me before opening up the other riceball.  
'If I know Mrs. Akamichi, then this riceball will be good. It's a shame I can't cook or I'd try to make my own once in a while.'  
"What about you Kina, what do you want our sensei to be like?" Kiba asked as he too finished his lunch, giving the last bit to Akamaru who was perched on his head.  
I thought about it for a moment before answering, "I guess a combination of all your views. Someone who is kind and gentle, but is also strong willed and powerful enough to help us all become stronger."  
Kiba nodded at my answer "Good answer. I think this team will do okay, don't you?" I nodded, as did Hinata. Even Shino who hadn't said anything gave a small inclination of his head. I guess that he had been observing us this lunch time and trying to figure out whether he could work with us or not. I thought it over and leaned back so the grass became my pillow.  
'Thankfully none of us are at odds with each other on day one. That’s good. As for our sensei, I guess we'll have to just wait and see.'


	4. Chapter 4 - Yuhi Kuranai

The 4 of us sat scattered across an empty classroom. Hinata and I sat near the front next to each other. Kiba sat alittle way away from us whereas Shino sat on the other side of the classroom. Our new sensei was due within the next few minutes.  
"I wonder...if sensei will...be a man or a ...woman." Hinata said glancing to the door every few seconds. I guess that she was wanting to make a good impression. As was I for that matter.  
"I don't know. I wouldn't mind either, if that makes sense. A ninja's gender doesn't decide their fighting abilities." I said getting a nod from Hinata. From the time I spent with Hinata this lunch time and the years that I'd known her I'd picked up that she seemed to abit more of a follower than a leader. Her personality was kind to say the least.  
It was while I was having these thoughts the door slid open, signalling the arrival of our new sensei.  
All 4 of us looked up as the person entered and shut the door. The first thing that struck me was that she was a woman, given that it was what Hinata and I had just been discussing. The second thing that stuck in my mind about her was that she was incredibly beautiful. She had a slender figure and long black hair which was worn in a messy sort of style. She had red eyes which I noted to be quite unique along with purple eye shadow and red lip stick. She wore what looked like a red under shirt with only one sleeve visible. Her forehead protected was tied around her head with a red sash and she also wore the standard Shinobi sandals. She also wore something which resembled a lose dress made of bandages with a pattern of what looked like rose thorns on it. Honestly I had no idea how to describe it but it looked awesome. She also wore lots of bandages on her hands and upper thighs.  
When she spoke her voice was pleasant and kind but also had a commanding tone to it which drew me in. "My name is Yuhi Kuranai and from today I will be your Jounin instructor. I want you all to train hard and not to disobey me as I am now the leader of squad 8." We were all taken aback alittle but I didn't mind. Kuranai-sensei seemed nice enough. "I'd like all of you up front so I can be properly introduced to you all." Kiba and Shino stood up before coming to sit next to me and Hinata. Soon enough all 4 of us....well 5 if you counted Akamaru were sitting in a line facing our new sensei. I could see Hinata squirming alittle as Kuranai looked over all of us. "Now that you know my name it is only fair for you lot to introduce yourselves to me. So let’s hear your names, likes, hates, hobbies and dreams for the future. The basics that people ask. I'll go first?" She suggested and we all nodded. "My name is Yuhi Kuranai, I like the food takowasa and vodka, however I dislike cake..."  
I was surprised at that, I had never met a person that disliked cake before. It was a change to say the least.  
"....my hobbies include having evening drinks, and I don't really know what my dreams for the future are, However my favourite phrase is 'Glory like a violet blooming a single day' ".  
We all took in the information and I thought over what I would say. The way that this was structured suggested that this was basic introductions between most sensei's and their new teams.  
Kuranai pointed to Hinata with a smile, "How about you introduce yourself first?"  
She jumped slightly at the sensei's directness but nodded. "My...my name is Hinata...Hinata Hyuuga, I like...cinnamon rolls and I dislike lots of violence and crab and shrimp. My hobbies include Flower pressing and I wish to become....a strong ninja...kind like my mother and strong....like...my father." Her voice faltered at the end but sensei nodded in approval.  
"Good, nice to meet you Hinata." She said and pointed to Shino this time. "And now you."  
Hinata, Kiba and I all looked towards Shino given that we hadn't really heard him speak since we got grouped together. Surprisingly he spoke. "I am Shino Aburame of the Aburame clan. I partial to insects and winter melon. I despise those who disrespect nature. My pastimes.... entomology and collecting new specimens for my insect collection. I currently have no desire for future plans."  
I blinked, as did the rest of us. I had not expected Shino to speak for so long.  
Kuranai sensei also nodded in approval at this and then pointed to Kiba, which disappointed me alittle as I wanted to be next. "Now, you with the dog."  
Kiba perked up. "My name is Kiba Inuzuka and this is Akamaru...” he explained pointing to the dog resting on the top of his hood who gave a bark. I smiled abit at that. "I like spending time with Akamaru and eating chewy foods and meats. I dislike foods that aren't chewy. My hobbies include going on walks with Akamaru and playing with Akamaru. And I haven't quite decided what I want to do in the future."  
His response also earned him a nod from Kuranai. She reached her hand out to Akamaru, her gaze asking permission from Kiba which he gave. Her hand patted Akamaru's head and Kuranai sensei smiled lightly. "Nice to meet you both. And finally the red head."  
I smiled as finally I would get to introduce myself. "My name is Tsukina Tanaka of the Tanaka Clan, but please call me Kina as I find my full name too formal. I like eating smoked salmon...well any food so long as it tastes good and going to the bath house and taking baths...." I thought for a moment before continuing "...I also enjoy stargazing and watching the sky with tea and a blanket. I dislike uncalled prejudice against others, being invaded personally and hanging upside down. And my dreams for the future are to one day pick up all the roles my family held within the village before their deaths and to help and give people a place they feel they belong, a home, friends, love whatever they want. Whatever they need. Sorry." I apologized nervously, "I also have a tendency to drone on."  
'God I probably could have shortened that down.'  
I also received a nod form Kuranai sensei. "Wonderful. It's pleasant to see that you are all a varied and unique group of young ninja who will undoubtedly have lots of varied abilities aswell." She sat down on the teacher’s desk in the centre of the room and crossed her arms over her chest. "Our training will begin tomorrow. I warn you, this training will be difficult and push your current abilities as well as push you to develop new ones. It is important that you all work together to help eachother develop and refine these new powers that you will develop. I will expect the best effort from all of you. Do you understand me?"  
"Yes Kuranai -sensei!" We all recited and she looked content with our answer.  
"Tomorrow will consist of you all explaining your individual powers and talents to one another along with demonstrating how they work. This way you will gain an insight into the way your team works before the real hard teamwork begins."  
"Yes!" We all recited again and this time she stood up.  
"Good, you are all dismissed for today. It was good to meet you all. Tomorrow we shall meet atop the Hokage face's at 9am sharp. Don't be late. That wouldn't be a good start." We all nodded and Shino, Kiba and Hinata stood up. I stayed put however, realizing a flaw in showing my team mates my abilities.  
"Kina. Are you coming?" Kiba asked as my green eyes met Kuranai-sensei's red ones.  
"In a moment. I have something to ask, I'll see you tomorrow." I said and he shrugged.  
"See you tomorrow then." With that the other 3 walked out leaving me alone with my new sensei.   
I felt her gaze on me as the door shut, the footsteps of the others trailing down the hall before fading into silence. I played with a strand of my pincer hair in slight nervousness to distract myself until she spoke. "Is there something you wish to speak to me about Kina?" She said and I noticed that she had taken to calling me by my nickname 'Kina', that was good.  
As I fought the urge to say 'obviously' I nodded. "It's about my abilities. I haven't used my Kekkei Genkai for anything but healing for the past 6 years. To say the least I'm a bit out of practice." I said slowly "I haven't used it for anything except healing since the deaths of my family."  
Kuranai sighed and walked over to me, she was much taller than me. I suddenly felt very small. And abit ashamed at my lack of strength and height. Shockingly however Kuranai sensei placed a hand on my shoulder instead of scolding my weakness like I thought she would have.  
"I've heard about the abilities of the Tanaka clan, and I can understand why you would be reluctant to use them." I felt the weight of her hand on my shoulder but I did not believe it was there to put me down. I grimaced as I remembered something that my father once did with our power. It wasn't like the person looked any different on the outside but it was what he did to his insides which was disturbing.  
"From what I know of your clan’s power, it has alot of potential, I think if you focus on what you feel comfortable with then you shall be fine." She said kindly and I nodded, it would appear that sensei was helping me on day one.  
I bowed my head in thanks. "Thank you, Kuranai sensei, I shall take your words to heart."  
She removed her hand and gestured towards the door, "If you feel most comfortable performing medical roles with your abilities then I will allow part of your training to be placed at the hospital where they will be best suited, however combat abilities are still a necessity, so I implore that you focus on them aswell."  
"Thank you again Sensei." I said and turned away from her towards the door "I'll see you tomorrow." With those words I walked out of the classroom door, feeling much more content with what tomorrow would bring.

\--+-- (Timeskip) --+--

"Damn it Shikamaru, you smell like smoke. What the Hell happened when you met your sensei? You get thrown in a smoke room or something?"  
Shikamaru groaned at my words "We might as well have, Chouji, Ino and myself were coughing through the whole introduction. He didn't even seem to care." I laughed a little as we arrived outside his house. "It's not funny, that damn smoke was stinging our eyes. He thought we all were crying." I laughed harder was we walked through the gate.  
"Whats the name of your sensei or should I just call him smoke guy?" I said when we eventually reached the front door. We both leaned down to take off our shoes and he replied.  
"My sensei's name is Asuma Sarutobi, and most likely a chain smoker given the stench of nicotine." Shikamaru reached own and placed his shoes next to the door, I did the same as we entered the matted halls of his home. "What about yours?"  
"Her name is Yuhi Kuranai, she's quite beautiful. Also from what I've experience from her she's also quite kind. She must be strong though, she is a Jounin afterall."  
Shikamaru nodded not bad I guess, we start training in the morning, that’s a drag." There were a group of large pillows in one corner of his living room, we both took the opportunity to burry ourselves in them, leaning against the softness. We were both incredibly lazy. Admittedly it was only after I started living with Shikamaru that I became as lazy as I am now, his laziness rubbed off on me.  
"We start training tomorrow, we have to demonstrate our individual abilities to each other so that we can begin to develop our skills as a team." I informed him causing him to look at me, I picked up some slight concern in his eyes.  
"Will you use it? You haven't used it in a while." I nodded.  
"Fighting without it will be a drag. I might aswell get over it." Shikamaru smirked at his own key word in my response. We lay against the pillows for several moments just resting, it was nice. The pillows were a light cream colour, the whole main room in itself was very clean. Yoshino Nara didn't like mess.....  
It was as I said that I felt a familiar nagging at the back of my mind. My room was a mess and I needed to clean it, especially before Yoshino saw it. Yeh, that was surprisingly urgent now. I abruptly stood up, feeling abit light headed, the image of the world spinning a moment before settling again. Shikamaru opened his eyes and looked up at me as I swayed slightly, "Going somewhere?"  
"Yeh, to clean my room before your mum sees it, I'm not getting grounded again." I explained and headed towards the door.  
"What a drag." He responded and shut his eyes again, making himself more comfortable, shrugging I left the room shutting the door behind me and ascended the stairs to my room. Thankfully it was still a mess, which meant Yoshino hadn't seen it. That was good. I shut the door especially quietly as not to alert anyone downstairs to my presence. I don't want Yoshino coming up midway through afterall.

\--+-- (Timeskip) --+--

"Well that took longer than I expected." I groaned falling against my door. A smallish light grey piece of cloth was tied around my hair to prevent getting dust in it while I cleaned. My hair got dirty easily. A broom rested against the wall to my right, I'd just finished sweeping. Satisfied I looked around my now clean room; no clothes littered the floor anymore, the dirty ones now resided in a wooden washing basket, the floor was finally clean and clean. My bookshelf was organised, everything in order. As was my chest of drawers and the strange collection of items that lived on top of it such as more books, the Tanaka clan's house keys and a flask. The throws and posters on the walls were finally hanging straight, I had packed away some of throws to reveal pale wall making the room feel bigger and cleaner.  
It looked much better.  
I breathed out and leaned against the broom, pulling myself up slowly. The cleaning instrument became my walking stick for a moment while I regained my balance on my own two feet. I reached my arm up and pulled the cloth from my hair. A cascade of dust fell of the cloth and around me at my action. It irritated me given my cleaning mode had just finished.  
I groaned but decided to ignore the dust. I pulled open my door and made my way to the cupboard and placed the broom in it. I placed the cloth in a washing basket that also resided in the cupboard. Thankfully after finishing this task I heard Yoshino call up to me. "Kina, dinner's ready!"  
I headed down to the dining room. Dinner was the same as normal except on one point.  
"Your aunt's letter arrived today Kina. She had a separate letter for Yoshino and me aswell." Shikaku told me as we ate. I felt rather curious and both worried at the words. It was usual for my aunt to send me letters. We both wished to keep in touch and she would send me money from my family’s inheritance every few weeks. However it was rare of her to send a separate letter to Yoshino and Shikaku even if they were the ones watching over me, usually she would put something at the end of my own letter from her to ask them. So naturally I was abit put out by this.  
"Anything I should be worried about?" I asked and placed some more food in my mouth, I chewed it as I waited for an answer. Shikaku shook his head.  
"No nothing for you to be concerned over. Your aunt was just wondering whether or not you still planned to stay living with us now that you've graduated from the academy."  
I swallowed my food and looked towards both of Shikamaru's parents. They were both watching my reactions. I smiled at them, "If it is still no bother to you than I still wish to remain living here. I do intend to return to my family’s home, I just don't know if I'm ready for that yet." They both nodded in understanding and thankfully that was the end of that topic. I was glad for it, whenever the issue of me returning to the Tanaka house arose it reminded me, reminded me that as much as I was welcomed here and felt this place was my home, I did not truly belong here. In their home.  
"We won't make you leave here until you feel ready to go, Kina. Even if you do forget to tidy your room every once in a while." Yoshino said the last phrase with a hint of a smile, clearly she knew about the state my room had been in but hadn't mentioned it.  
I grinned in embarrassment, "Yeh Sorry. It's clean now though."  
Shikaku smirked at me and Shikamaru behind a mouthful of food. The rest of dinner was normal enough and I finished up the cleaning in the kitchen wanting to go and read my aunt's letter, Yoshino had told me she left it on the small table in the hallway for me to collect after cleaning. I grimaced though when I realised how much cleaning I had actually done today. The letter was abit thicker than usual and in a white envelope. There was a mark in the top right corner with the cloud pattern of Kumogakure in identify where the letter had come from. I picked it up and noted that the letter weighed alittle more than usual aswell. I turned it around and saw her husband’s clan seal on the back of the envelope. I raised an eyebrow at that. My aunt had probably misplaced her own seal again, she was abit scatter brained so her sending me letters with her husband’s seal on them wasn't uncommon. She may be a Tanaka by birth but she was also a member of her husband's clan in Kumogakure now, so when I think about it she really could get away with using both.  
I took the letter upstairs to my room and perched on my bed when I entered. I could clean my room to perfection sometimes but I could never properly make my bed, it would have to remain in the same state it had been when I got out of it in the morning. I don't know why I felt that way but I did.  
I carefully broke the grey seal on the back of the envelope, it was circular but had a line cutting through it, 2 thirds of the way down it and 4 small circles in a square formation alittle above it. It was the symbol of the Shimizu clan of Kumogakure, the family of my aunt’s husband and hers now too.  
I first took out the letter, it was easily distinguishable between the other contense of the envelope. I opened it and began to read.

Dear Kina,  
First off sorry for the long wait for your letter, it's ben hectic for me and I do apologize, with that building collapsing and everything I've almost been living in the hospital. It's driving Keigo mad (even though you can't really see it on his face).  
Secondly, congratulations on becoming Genin and graduating from the academy. You’re a ninja now and it's scary how quickly you’re growing up, rather spooky actually. I'm not able to leave Kumogakure right now though as much as I would like to congratulate you in person, one work is a pain and two, it's rather taxing (not to mention unwise for an international relations standpoint) to gain permission from the Raikage to leave Kumogakure for anything other than emergencies and your birthday. I will come and see you when the Chuunin exams take place though, given that they are hosted in Konoha this year the Raikage will allow me to come see you...probably....I'm just thankful the Raikage was so good about my living here and visiting to Konoha....at least our villages are doing something to try and make some good ties with each other, no matter how small.  
I understand that you will be beginning your intensive training soon and so therefore I wish to talk to you about that. I mainly use our family jutsu and Kekkei Genkai for healing and other roles in the medical profession. Your father on the otherhand, as you know used them in combat. I know that you have been studying medical Ninjutsu for the past 9 years and that is where you excel but I implore you not to forget about the combat uses our family processes, I was never suited for combat so this attribute of the clan now rests with you. It's next head.  
I know that you will choose well, you live with some of the greatest minds in the world so it's kind of hard to screw up any decision when you’re with them. I know that you will continue with medical Ninjutsu so I recommend speaking with Shikaku Nara, the Nara clan is very knowledgeable about the medical profession and medicines and therefore they should be able to help you. As for combat I would recommend studying the movement of water and reading your fathers journals for further information on our clan Justus’s. I would try to teach you myself but it's impossible given my location.  
Also, learn to cook when you still have the free time. You always sucked at anything that involved living by yourself to I beg you to learn the skills before you actually have to use them. I almost burnt down the kitchen 3 days ago making rice. And rice is meant to be easy!!!!. If Keigo wasn't such a good cook we'd be living on take-out food and that is not a way to live.  
I also sent some extra money for you this month given that you’re graduating. Spend it on something: more books (god help you and the books), food, clothing, the bath house, weapons, medical supplies, anything. Just actually spend it this time. I know you saved the last lot I sent you, I still have eyes in Konoha. AKA Shikaku. You shouldn't have to worry about money, when you head the clan you'll have access to all of it and so long as you don't buy a candy shop or your own bath house you should be fine. I seriously hope you don't try to spend it all at once like your father once tried to do. He saw that stone garden and he wanted it. God only knows why he wanted a stone garden. Don't be like your father when it comes to money. Please! Please, I beg you!  
Also I grew my hair out. I enclosed a picture of Keigo and I in the envelope. Be sure to send one of your own team soon.  
I can't tell if I've left something out in this letter, if I have and you actually notice this time please remind me. I miss you lots and will defiantly come to see you in afew months for the Chuunin exams. Train hard, remember not to fall asleep on the roof and send me love through the form of more letters.  
Wishing you and the Nara's the best. Lots of love.  
Aunt Etsuko  
xxxxxx

I smiled as I shut the letter. It was just like Auntie Etsuko. Almost burning down the kitchen, medical Ninjutsu and her husband Keigo seemed to be the only things that could keep her full concentration. Occasionally me too but that was more rare. I took out the money she sent me next. Even as I picked it up I could feel the slight weight difference in the notes. There was more money here than normal. Seeing as I didn't always spend all my money I usually had spare so this just added to it.   
I shook my head as I thought over the things she suggested my buying. Books, I already had plenty of books, most of them were either history or medical books, or books to help me learn advanced medical Ninjutsu, yeh I don't think I'll need any more books anytime soon. Like my aunt said the Nara clan had a surprising amount of medicinal based books so I somehow ended up with alot of them in my room. Food was food, I'd buy it if I felt hungry or if someone else was hungry, mainly Choji Akamichi since he was always hungry. Clothing, I had enough clothes, Shikamaru was the one that originally picked out my current main outfit, the medium shade of grey top and shorts with the red vest top underneath. He had done it while I was ill so I hadn't been there to voice any objections to it, Yoshino hadn't been there either. I didn't mind the colour grey so I didn't mind this. Shikaku once said to me that if a man puts in a significant amount of conscious effort to get a girl something to wear than it would be polite to accept it without complaining, so that’s what I did. I liked it though, but unlike Shikamaru the red of my hair and the red of the top broke up the dark colours, not a light green jacket. He said given the brightness of my hair it was best to wear plain, black or grey colours like him otherwise I would be too bright when on missions and would be spotted easily, he did have a serious point. My casual clothes were much brighter and varied, ranging from shorts, to trousers, to skirts to dresses. I wasn't picky so long as it looked good. I have Ino to thank for that. I went to the bath house once a week so I wasn't likely to spend more money there. I didn't have any new weapons, the old ones were blunt and scratched to death given I'd been using them for years. I wasn't in official medical practice either so my supplies were average and running out. My aunt had an amazing group of medical supplies that she took with her everywhere. They were awesome.  
I weighed up the decisions in my mind while I counted out the money, there was defiantly alot more here than normal. About double it. If I combined it with the money I had saved then I should be able to buy both new ninja tools and medical supplies. Then I would be mostly out for the rest of the month. So long as I didn't impulse buy anything else than I should be fine.  
I left the money on my desk and grabbed a towel to go take a bath. The bath was just what I needed, plus it got all the extra dust out of my hair. On my way back to my room I noticed Shikamaru leaning on the edge of the door. He looked about ready to go to bed.  
I walked straight past him and leaned on my own door frame when I reached my room. "You standing outside your room for any other reason than to see me in a towel perv?" I teased and he just sighed, not fazed by me calling him a perv. We have lived together for 6 years now and I would spend about an hour wearing a towel per day after I had had my bath.  
"Don't be stupid Kina. I just wanted to know if your aunt said anything I'll need to worry about, like you doing some kind of new training or something. It'll be a drag if you have to work too hard."  
I laughed and held my pile of clothes closer to my chest in my arms, "You really do care. Nothing to report though. My aunt did send me some additional money so I was thinking of going to town and getting some supplies after training tomorrow. She wishes everyone well too."  
Shikamaru shrugged. "Just be sure to tell my mum this time, I'm not getting in trouble for you it's too much of a drag." I nodded to his words.  
"I'll tell her in the morning. Any idea of what I should write back to my aunt, she suggested sending a picture of my new team, but I think one of us would be good too." I stroked an imaginary beard as I thought.  
"I do have that one picture of us on hand, but it’s from when we were 8 and is quite...." He trailed off and I knew exactly what photo he was speaking about. I laughed.  
"Oh yeh that one!" I slapped my hands against my face and made my face look like I had just walked in on something awful, with my jaw dropped. I made the face for a second or so before dropping my hands and returning my expression to normal. "I love that photo, I've never seen you more shocked in my life."  
Shikamaru shook his head "I'm going to bed before the image gets stuck in my mind. Night!" With that he slipped back into his room and shut the door. I figured I'd do the same, but first I quickly ran to the top of the stairs and called down a quick "Good night!" before retreating to my own room. I quickly got dried and changed into my pyjamas, placing my dirty clothes in my washing basket. I then ran my towel through my hair to dry it as quickly as possible. The picture of my aunt and Keigo still rested on my desk in the envelope. Once I was done I went to pull it out.  
My aunt’s hair certainly was much longer, it tumbled past her shoulders in waves until they reached mid back. Her hair was beautiful, like my own it was also dark red at the roots and then a lighter red when it reached the ends of her hair. Everyone born into the Tanaka clan had red hair, but it was those whose hair changed shade from roots to tips possessed our Kekkei Genkai. It was how we knew who had the power before it fully manifested. Those who processed the skill also were given names which contained 'Tsu' in them, like my name 'Tsukina'. My aunt was Etsuko and my father had been Natsuhiko (people just called him 'Natsu' for ease.)  
My sister hadn't been born with the power though, so her hair had just been plain red, and had been called Mei.  
My aunt's eyes were also light green and she was of average skin tone too. My aunt was very beautiful, although abit crazy at times. Her husband Keigo on the otherhand was more calm and serious, he was good with kids which had been the first thing my aunt had liked about him when she first met him on a mission to the cloud village when she was working as an envoy. He had darker skin and dark brown eyes. His hair was also long and white, it was kept in a ponytail that hung infront of his shoulder on the right side. He was of average build and height, his cooking skills were one of the main things I thought about him with. The man could cook for the Gods. I had been to Kumogakure once and that was only for afew days, my aunt had been dangerously ill and I had went to be with her. Her illness had been considered a reasonable enough reason to both villages for me to good see her, but during the days that I had stayed with them I had been living off Keigo's cooking. I did not want to leave, the food was so good. He had sent me a cook book for my birthday last year but I had yet to try making anything.  
I pinned the picture up on the space of wall above my desk and headed for my bed. The covers were cold so I spent awhile just lying in them to warm them up. I stared at the photo as I lay there. I missed them both but I knew my aunt would visit soon, she never stayed away for too long.  
Slowly I shut my eyes and drifted off to sleep.


	5. Chapter 5 - Demonstrations

"Kina get up now." banging "Kina!" more banging ensued "Tsukina Tanaka if you don't get up in the next 30 seconds than your grounded!"  
I opened my eyes groggily and zoned in on the sounds that had disturbed my peaceful slumber. Someone was banging on the door and they sounded angry. I rolled off my bed and onto the floor with a thud, moving like a slug, wrapped in my duvet to the door. Somehow I stood up and opened it.  
"Yes?!" I answered rubbing my eyes and looking at the person infront of me. It was Yoshino and she looked angry. All traces of sleep vanished as I looked into her eyes. She was pissed off.  
"It's about darn time Tsukina. Any later and you'd be grounded again. Your late up, it's 8:15." Yoshino didn't wait for a reply, she just walked away and hit Shikamaru's door with a fist as she passed it. "If you two aren't downstairs and at the table in 5 minutes then you can leave without breakfast."  
I nodded my head even though Yoshino couldn't see me and rushed into my room, shutting the door behind me. I almost tripped up on my duvet in my haste. Within 20 seconds I was rid of the duvet and my pyjamas, both having been thrown over my head frantically. I ran to my chest of drawers and pulled out another pair of my grey and sand outfit, quickly changing underwear and placing the red mesh t-shirt on before pulling on my shorts and top. I grabbed a pair of socks and hopped about on one leg as I made my way out the door while trying to put my socks on. I remembered my sandle boots were downstairs.  
'I'm just going to refer to them as boots for ease!'  
I wasn't just running because I would miss breakfast although that was a large factor, it was more the fact that I was meant to be atop the Hokage faces in about 40 minutes.  
I almost threw myself into a chair. To make sure I wasn't going to be late. Within the next 30 seconds Shikamaru walked into the room and sat down opposite me. Unlike me, he didn't look rushed at all. He yawned as Yoshino brought out the food. I nodded my head to her as a sign of thanks and she walked back into the kitchen. The moment she was gone I grabbed some food and started eating. There was cereal so I poured myself a bowl before proceeding to stuff my face. Shikamaru just shook his head at me.  
"Can't you eat any slower, you’re going to choke." I shook my head and he just turned back to his food sighing. He was eating toast with plain butter, I made a mental note to grab a piece to run out the door with. I wasn't just rushing because I was hungry or anything it was because I didn't like being late, especially on days which you can make quite an impression of yourself. I wanted to be early especially since getting to the meeting point atop the Hokage faces would take a while. After the better part of 3 minutes I was finished eating.  
"Have you told my mum you’re going shopping after training today?" I shook my head and stood up from my chair picking up my empty bowl of cereal.  
"I plan to tell her now actually." I admitted and began to walk through to the kitchen, "Do you want me to pick you up anything while I'm out?" I offered, he shook his head however.  
"It's a drag but I'll go myself. I need to get afew things but I won't have you pay for them." I nodded and walked through to the kitchen placing the bowl on a counter. Yoshino was still in there and was packing away some clean dishes into an overhead cupboard.  
"Thank you for breakfast Yoshino. Is it possible for me to go to the shops after school today, I need some new supplies given that I begin training today. My aunt sent me some money for medical supplies aswell so....." I trailed off and Yoshino turned to face me, thankfully she didn't look angry like she did when I first saw her this morning.  
"Be back in time for dinner, that’s all I'm going to say. Also make sure you don't spend all your money for the rest of the month. You never know when you'll need it." She had her arms crossed over her chest so I knew that she was serious. I nodded and smiled.  
"Thank you. I'll be heading off, I have quite a walk this morning." I began to head back through to the dining room when a voice stopped me.  
"Kina!"  
I turned my head back around and faced Yoshino, she was holding a box tied with a cloth around it in her hand. The cloth was a faded red so I recognized it immediately. It was my lunch. Slowly I walked up to Yoshino and collected the box, she gave me a small smile which I returned before leaving the room completely. When I entered the dining room Shikamaru was just getting up after finishing his own breakfast.  
"You get permission?" I nodded and we both walked out into the wooden floored hallway. We paused at the shoe rack right by the front door so I could put my shoes on. After zipping up the boots I faced him. His expression was his normal lazy one. "I guess I'll see you later then, geez this training is going to be such a drag." I laughed as he said that. Patting down my pockets to make sure I still had my money I pulled open the front door.  
"Have a good day Shika, I hope your training goes well." I said and waved as I walked out the door. My pouch of ninja tools was strapped around my lower back. I didn't run, I wanted to arrive early but I wasn't going to exert myself, there was no point in getting tired before I even got there.  
The walk was uneventful, unfortunately I didn't run into anyone I knew to liven up the trek. I was there within 25 minutes. There was a bunch of rocks that looked like they had randomly been dropped atop the hill. Shino had already arrived, he sat on one of the rocks and seemed to watch me as I walked over to sit on a rock.....or at least I think he was watching me, It's rather difficult to tell considering that he wears thick black lensed glasses and a hood that covered most of the lower half of his face.  
Hinata was also there aswell, she was sitting lower down on the rock pile than Shino, she smiled shyly as I approached. Hinata sat elegantly or at least more pleasantly than my average way of sitting and held her lunchbox clutched in her hands. It too was wrapped up in a cloth, hers was a pale peach colour.  
I waved my hand as a sign of greeting to Shino before plopping down next to Hinata.  
"When did you arrive? I asked and crossed my legs while placing my lunch between them.  
"Around...5..5.. minutes ago. I ... I..didn't want to make a negative impression on our sensei on the first day of our ....training." She explained as I met her silver eyes.  
"That was my plan too." I admitted and looked around at where we were sitting. There was a vast expense of ground behind us. In front of us however was the real impressive sight. We could see the whole hidden leaf village from where we sat. Too say the least it looked alot smaller when you weren’t walking through it. It was just a mass of multicolored roofs now.  
"Yo!"  
Hinata and I turned our heads to the left and saw Kiba. He was walking over to the rest of us, his hood was down which showed off his spiky brown hair. Akamaru was resting on Kiba's head like usual. "Seems like I'm the last one to arrive."  
"Good morning Kiba." Hinata greeted as Kiba came and lounged next to the two of us. He nodded as I reached over to pet Akamaru, the small dog rubbing his head into my hand. The puppy had really soft ears, sort of silky. Kiba watched me in amusement, I could tell we had afew more moments before sensei was to show up. The time was spent peacefully enjoying each other’s company before the training began.  
Kuranei sensei arrived in a swirl of leaves. From what I could guess it was a use of genjutsu. The first we knew of it was when the area infront of us began to pick up wind. The wind then began to spiral upward gathering leaves which I hadn't noticed before which changed into a red colour before Kuranei sensei appeared before us all with a small smile, her sudden appearance surprised us. Hinata jumped up alittle, I fell off the rock I had been sitting cross legged on and somehow managed to catch my lunch, Kiba sprung up so quickly that Akamaru fell off his head and onto his lap, his jaw was dropped wide in shock. Shino on the otherhand didn't seem to react so that was normal.  
"I'm glad that you all arrived on time that marks a good start to the day. However it's clear that none of you have any talent for detecting genjutsu or approaching chakra." Sensei announced. With her words I noticed Hinata shrink in on herself alittle which made me feel abit sad for her, I didn't know why though. "I don't want you to be disheartened now, genjutsu and chakra detection are a complicated art and we can figure them out in time. I hope you all are ready to give your team a presentation, you all cannot hope to work together if you don't know the ins and outs of each other’s abilities and the strengths that they can bring to a group."  
We all nodded as we ingested the sudden information that our sensei was giving us. Kiba's mouth shut and Shino jumped down to land on a rock next to Hinata, which made her jolt in surprise. I on the otherhand made no attempt to move off the ground.  
"Anyone want to volunteer a demonstration first?" Sensei asked crossing her arms across her chest. None of us moved. Her red eyes surveyed the 4 of us before resting on Kiba, "Seeing as none of you are offering, Kiba Inuzuka will go first." There was no room in sensei's voice for discussion so Kiba stood up and walked over to where Kuranei was standing, grumbling about having to go first while he went. As he moved to stand infront of us, sensei took his place on the rock next to Hinata as a seat.  
I moved my attention back to Kiba who seemed abit put out about a demonstration of his powers. "Hey, sensei. What sort of things am I meant to say?" He asked pointing at Kuranei.  
"Well...I guess the generic jutsu that you learnt in the academy, additional unspecialized jutsu, fighting style, chakra nature....that is if you actually know it, clan jutsu, and if you have one, Kekkei Genkai. Additionally, if you can, please give everyone a demonstration of your jutsu aswell to help with descriptions." She explained and began to count off what she said on her fingers before smiling at Kiba, "Need a better prompt?"  
Kiba shook his head and knelt on the ground to pat Akamaru, "Well...I know the general jutsu that are taught at the academy such as the clone jutsu and the transformation technique. I'm mainly a Ninjutsu and Taijutsu user....I think. I don't know what my chakra nature is. My clan, the Inuzuka clan are unique because a large number of our techniques are used in collaboration with our dogs. I have Akamaru here so he's my partner. Being a member of the Inuzuka clan I have very fast reflexes and a highly advanced sense of smell, I do this by focusing my chakra into my nose, this can make my sense of smell up to 1000 times stronger than that of a humans, which is pretty awesome.....although I haven't quite perfected that yet. The sense of smell can also determine the physical condition of an individual, even from a considerable distance so that’s awesome too, on the otherhand if I'm exposed to foul smelling odres then it can debilitate me drastically which is really not good. Akamaru and I can also use a clan just called the 'Four legs technique', this involves giving accelerated fighting instinct and reflexes to the user. I can then obtain high speed movement and reflexes like that of a wild animal, it can also add more feral-like appearances to the user such as canine teeth, claw-like length nails and wild eyes. My clan doesn't have a Kekkei Genkai so I can leave that out, although I have currently started working on a new technique so I haven't quite got it down yet. It's called 'Fang over Fang', that allows Akamaru and myself to attack an enemy at almost impossibly high speeds in coordination with our claws." Kiba glanced at all of us with a small smile on his face, "That’s about it for now, I guess."  
Sensei nodded, "That’s very good Kiba, you seem to be someone that can be used for tracking due to your sense of smell and at the same time fast powerful frontal attacks, impressive. We shall work on your current techniques so you can perfect them. You may sit now." Kiba nodded back and began to walk back over to the rock pile before sitting down. Sensei pointed at me next to my personal chagrin. "You’re up next Kina. Be sure to give a thorough description like Kiba."   
I nodded and pushed myself off the rocky ground and stood where Kiba had been a minute ago with my back to the view of Konoha. I took a moment to dust myself off before speaking. I met sensei's eyes as I spoke, along with Hinata's, she gave me a small smile for encouragement which I returned.  
"I...uh. I may drone on a bit, just to give you fair warning." I warned and nervously rubbed the back of my head before thinking over Kuranei's checklist in my mind. "Well, like Kiba said I also know the academy taught jutsu such as the substitution jutsu, the escape jutsu, clone jutsu, transformation jutsu, etcetera etcetera. I don't know my chakra nature, I would assume it's water for reasons I will explain. I'm mainly a Ninjutsu and Taijutsu user in terms of combat. I'm quite a good gymnast. My clan jutsu is a blood manipulation jutsu; upon blood exiting my body I am able to manipulate it as a weapon in different forms, seeing as it's blood I'm controlling it can be changed into many different things; the reason my clan does this is because the chakra network that distributes chakra throughout the body is intricately interwoven with all the internal organs and the circulatory system which distributes blood around the body, this means that a shinobi's body is closely interwoven with their chakra and therefore by manipulating the chakra in our blood we are able to manipulate the blood within our bodies. An upside to my abilities is that my clan has a technique which prevents it's members from losing too much blood, it is called the blood replenishment jutsu, rather tricky to preform but it allows me to constantly use my blood, this is because whenever the blood leaves my body, my body assimilates my remaining blood and produces more of it instantaneously, the blood is produced independently from my will so i do not expend any unnecessary chakra while performing it." I stopped to take a breath after that long sentence, "However as good as that sounds my blood will only replenish itself if I have a certain level of chakra remaining that means that I have the possibility of bleeding out upon running out of chakra, then I would die....which is not good." I laughed nervously and reached round to pull a kunai out of my weapons pouch before holding it up to one of my fingers, "Additionally in order to use my jutsu requires some form of external injury. To put it mildly I'm no masochist, I'm scared of inflicting pain on myself. I guess my sense of self-preservation is too strong or something stupid like that."   
To prove my point I focused on the kunai on my hand. I suddenly wasn't aware of the presence of the others, my finger and the kunai infront of me were the only things that mattered. I gritted my teeth as I tried to bring the small blade across my finger in order cut it enough to draw blood, it was almost if while one hand tried to drive the blade across my finger another invisible hand held it back.  
'Crappy comparison I know.'  
Afew more moments passed before I stopped trying and put the kunai away. I sighed and looked up to see the faces of my team mates and sensei. They didn't look disappointed with me, which I was glad for. I continued my explanation. "I also process a Kekkei Genkai which is called 'Chiwana', it means 'blood trap'. In order to use the jutsu I must ingest the intended opponent’s blood, any amount will render the ability effective. By ingesting another’s blood my body then assimilates it and converts my own blood to respond to it, when I do this it allows me to control the blood within another person’s body the same way I manipulate my own. Using this ability it allows me inflict massive internal damage to an opponent through haemorrhaging and organ rupturing/crushing." As I was explaining this I was also gesturing to several internal organs to help develop my point.  
"However, the most important thing to know about Chiwana is that I don't normally use it for combat. My greatest and probably only strength lies in my medical prowess. I have been training in medical Ninjutsu since I was 4 years old so I have 9 years training so far. I pride myself on my medical skills as their advancement compensates for my current lack of combat use. The reason my medical skills are so advanced is partly because of my Chiwana; the use of the power requires a keen insight to the workings of the human body. Additionally by assimilating a patient’s blood with Chiwana my healing jutsu becomes more specialised to the patient and heals an injury and patient faster and more efficiently than normal medical Ninjutsu. However a downside of using Chiwana in the medical profession is that because it is so specialised to individual patients, it is hard for regular shinobi medical Ninjutsu to be applied to the same person afterwards. The generalised medical Ninjutsu can sometimes even reverse the recovery process made by the Chiwana. It is because of this members of my clan are often requested and paid for as private specialists as........." I trailed off as I suddenly realised how in depth I had gone with my descriptions. I realised that I didn't have to unload all of this information on my team at once. "I'm so very sorry." I announced, quickly bowing my head, "I did say I could drone on for quite abit and this is just the proof of my statement."  
As I raised my head I noticed that Kuranei sensei was smiling at me, her voice calming. "You don't need to apologize Kina. I'm grateful that you provided us with such in-depth information on your abilities, this will make them easier to understand. Just so you know, self-preservation is not a condemnable quality to possess, however we will work on your mental block when activating your jutsu along with Kiba's own techniques.  
I nodded and walked back over to where everyone else was sitting and sat down myself next to Hinata again.  
"Next, Shino Aburame. Show us what sorts of things you can do." Sensei announce and Shino slowly walked up to the 'demonstration spot'.  
As he did so I focused on the tip of my finger that I had attempted to cut with a kunai, there was no indication that I had even tried to cut it. A mental 'block' that’s one way of putting it. I sighed lightly and focused back on what Shino had begun to say.  
\--+-- (Timeskip - About 25 minutes) --+--  
"Now. I hope all of you can see that you each have unique and specialised techniques, ranging from short range to long range, from internal to external." I noticed Sensei's eyes survey us as she spoke, her eyes drifting to me and Hinata as she said 'internal', "Given what all of you have told me there’s something specific that I would like you all to do for me."  
Kiba and I nodded, "What is it Kuranei sensei?" We asked while the others remained silent. Sensei smiled and gestured to our lunches which all of us had placed on a single rock.  
"It's a surprise exercise, but you will complete it after lunch. Explanations of each other’s abilities took us quite a while so I will let you stop and refuel first. It is important for a shinobi to do whatever they can to ensure that they are always at full strength."  
Kiba and I nodded again.  
"I'll be back when the exercise will begin, try to be finished eating by then." Kuranei told us before making a hand sign and disappearing the same way she had arrives, in a swirl of leaves.  
With sensei's disappearance Kiba started speaking. "Well whatever this exercise it, Akamaru and I will be able to complete it no problem, no matter what crazy moves or jutsu she makes us do." He stood up from the rock he was sitting on and walked over to where everyones lunches were, without asking he picked up all 4 and brought them over. He paused for a second to hand Shino his as he was sitting alittle away from me and Hinata (by about a metre), Shino gave him a small incline of his head as Kiba handed him his lunch. Given that Shino had talked at length...ish about his bug based abilities I didn't expect to hear from him for the rest of today, after all it had been the most I had ever heard Shino speak before anyway.  
Kiba then handed me and Hinata our lunches before sitting down on the rock to our right. He placed his own next to him and placed Akamaru onto his head who gave a small bark. Hinata and I opened our lunch boxes and all of us began to eat. As I ate I noticed how neat and tasty Hinata's box looked.  
"Hey Hinata, who made your lunch? It looks amazing." I said and this drew Kiba's attention to Hinata aswell which caused her to blush.  
"Yeh. As far as lunches go that’s pretty cool." He said through a mouthful of some kind of meat, he was holding some up to Akamaru who took the offered food from Kiba's hand.  
"I....I made it." She stuttered and looked down at the box on her lap. I was impressed and leaned over her shoulder to look at it better. "If..if you like..you..can try some." She said to me and I nodded eagerly.  
"If it tastes anything like how good it looks than I'll be in heaven." I said as Hinata picked out some tempura on her chopsticks and held it up to me. I took it in my own and nodded to her. "Thanks." As I put the tempura in my mouth I realised just how right I was, this was amazing.  
"Hinata, you’re an amazing cook. Has anyone ever told you that?" I said as I swallowed the food and slowly came back from heaven.  
She blushed again slowly shook her head which I found abit of a shame. "Well be prepared for me to tell you that every day now. Not being able to cook anything but rice and potatoes myself I'll be living off your cooking now, be prepared for that."  
Hinata giggled alittle which surprised me and Kiba who looked up from his food again. "If you would like Kina...I ...well I could teach you. Since you know, we are on the same team now." She said and I smiled.  
"To cook?"  
She nodded and I reached over to pat her head lightly. "There’s no way I'm denying cooking instruction from a food goddess." I said and caused Hinata to turn red again as I called her a 'Goddess.'  
With that said I went back to eating my own lunch, making small talk with Kiba and Hinata, Shino just listened from a distance. Kuranei sensei arrived afew minutes after we had all finished. She seemed to have made arriving in a swirl of leaves her thing or something as this was the 3rd time she had done it today now.  
"I trust you are all well fed now." She said to which we nodded. "Good because I would like you to do something for me. Stand up."  
We all complied with Kuranei's wishes and stood up from the rock. She pointed to the patch of dirt that we had been explaining our abilities to each other on and we all moved to it.  
"This activity will test the patience, will to fight, and will to protect between of your team, where I feel that each member will be best suited. Hinata!" Sensei called, causing Hinata to jump alittle. "I want you to activate you Byakugan."  
Hinata nodded and activated her Kekkei Genkai, the veins around her eyes suddenly looked strained and were clearly noticeable beneath her skin which showed that she was using the ability.  
"Good." sensei announced, "Now Kiba and Akamaru!” Kiba stood up alittle straighter and looked poised and ready to move and do whatever Kuranei said. "No matter what happens I need you and Akamaru to stay as still as possible. Even if you want to move you are forbidden to until I say so."  
We all seemed abit taken aback by this but Kiba was most of all. Regardless of personal feelings he still complied. "Kuranei-sensei, why do I have to stay still?" He demanded but got no reply.  
"Hinata, I would like you to use your gentle fist technique on Kiba when I give you the command. Unless you convince me that you are attacking to incapacitate Kiba, then you will fail." Hinata gulped quietly as Sensei gave her orders.  
"Kina!" I stood up as Kuranei sensei called me too. "I want you to use your blood manipulation jutsu to defend Kiba when I order Hinata to attack him. As Kiba is unable to move, you will be his shield."  
My eyes widened and I clenched my fists. I understood what Sensei meant now.  
'Patience, was Kiba who wasn't allowed to move when someone attacked him which is the opposite of his pugnacious behavior. Will to fight, Hinata who didn't really like fighting and went out of her way not to hurt others. Will to protect, me, to try and surpass my own mental block to protect my teammate.'  
I see what this is. Making us travel outside our comfort zone. I sighed and nodded, pulling a kunai out of my weapons pouch.  
Kuranei nodded and asked Shino to step to the side away from the rest of his team. I found that abit strange but managed to put it out of my mind, instead I focused on holding the kunai above the skin of my left arm, to defend against the gentle fist would require more blood than a simple cut finger.  
"I will count down from 10 and then I want Hinata to strike Kiba, in the process I want Kina to try and defend Kiba from Hinata." Sensei announced and Hinata turned to Kiba with reluctance in her eyes. I moved to that I was to the side of Kiba and to the side of Hinata, so I was a decent distance between the two of them without getting in the way, alittle way away Shino stood, roughly infront of me. The blade of the kunai still hadn't moved a millimeter closer to my arm.  
"10, 9, 8..."  
I willed the blade closer to my skin and felt Kiba and Akamaru's eyes on me. Sensei made it worse by counting down from 10. Hinata activated her Byakugan and I saw Kiba's muscles tense showing that he wanted to move.  
"7...”  
I pressed the blade onto my arm and willed myself to cut the skin, but I couldn't.  
"6..."  
You know those moments someone has when they have something like an epiphany or realize something important, that’s what I just had. I snapped my eyes to Shino who was standing opposite me, even without seeing his eyes I could tell he was looking at mine, he gave that kind of impression.  
"5..."  
I looked up at him and then back down to the kunai hovering above my arm, I kept repeating the action with my eyes hoping he would get the message.  
"4..."  
He did. I shut my eyes.  
"3...2..."  
I felt a hand close around the one I was holding my kunai and heard Hinata gasp. Within the moment I felt sudden throbbing pain erupt in my left arm as the skin was sliced by the blade. I heard myself cry out.  
"1!"  
"Ninja art, Tanaka style, blood manipulation jutsu." I announced and felt within the red liquid for my own chakra, I found it and pulled with my right hand to where I predicted Hinata's hand to go. I could feel the blood suspended in the air infront of Kiba, I could feel when Hinata's palm connected with the blood shield, her chakra pulsing through it and overwhelming my control of the blood before it fell to the ground. But most of all I could feel the pain.  
I opened my eyes to see Hinata fixated on the place where Kiba was. Kiba was staring at Hinata's palm and slowly gulped. No-one moved for several moments before Kuranei’s voice sounded from behind all of us.  
"Very good. You all have done well."  
I gritted my teeth and released all remaining control of the blood that had fallen to the ground, I grabbed my bleeding arm with my right one out of instant and tried not to let my eyes water from the pain. The throbbing ache resonated through my entire arm and I could feel that with every beat of my heart, my blood was trying to replicate itself and replace what had been lost through the injury. It had been awhile since I had been cut like this so my body was clearly responding more intensely than it would if I was using my abilities constantly. My arm slowly began to shake as the pain throbbed through it.  
I watched Kiba's eyes turn from Hinata to Shino who was standing behind me, "What the Hell did you do that for Shino, you've really hurt Kina."  
Kuranei sensei walked over to Kina and placed a hand on his shoulder. It seemed to calm him abit, although he was still glaring at Shino. "You seem to misunderstand Kiba, this was test of teamwork. Shino did exactly as Kina asked him. This exercise was made to test you all mentally and your teamwork. I took the 3 of you out of your comfort zones just like you will undoubtedly find yourself in on real missions however the main point of this was for you to realize your luck in team 8 being a squad which pocesses 4 members, you have more people to reply on if things don't work in your favour. I deliberately left Shino without commands in the hope that you would realize this and use each other just like you would on a mission."  
Kiba seemed to deflate and nodded curtly at Shino. "Well I guess if that’s the deal then sorry for judging." Akamaru yipped as if showing his agreement with Kiba's words. Hinata looked towards my arm with worry evident in her eyes.  
"Kina, your hurt!"  
I waved my hand slightly as if to dismiss the worry, almost hissing as my right arm let go of my left, I was highly aware of the blood on my right fingers.  
"I'll be fine. We're a team now so sorry but you'll have to get used to seeing blood if I'm here. Sorry for having such a crude ability. I'll heal it." I breathed out and hovered my right hand over the wound on my lower left arm. Shino had cut through the fabric and a dark cut was engraved in my arm. Blood stuck to my clothing around the cut and would occasionally drip to the ground  
"I also apologize for the mess it will make. Let’s try to train outside as much as possible." I joked as I focused my chakra into the palm of my right hand, a light red glow was emitted from my hand and instantly the horrible pain in my arm was made less severe.  
"Why's your hand glowing red?" Kiba asked and I smiled at him.  
"Blood's my thing so lots of things associated with me are red, my hair and the colour of my medical Ninjutsu, well at least its red when I use my Kekkei Genkai for healing." I explained and he nodded. I focused in on the inner workings of my arm. A vein had been severed which wasn't too major and was to be expected, the cut had been close to part of the radial artery but not enough to disturb it. The blood around the wound began to shift into the form of temporary vascular pathways that connected the sides of the cut and began to allow blood to move naturally through my arm again.  
I sighed and looked back to the rest of my team. Hinata was smiling at me slightly as I healed myself while Kiba was looking across at the rest of Konoha. Shino, I couldn't tell where he was looking but I could tell it wasn't at me. Kuranei began to speak to Hinata about her use of the gentle fist and I listened silently.  
Within afew minutes my cut was almost completely healed. My final step was to release my control over the blood that I had been using as a temporary vascular pathway as the real thing had been healed around it, the blood just rejoining the rest of the blood that flowed around my body.  
"All done!" I announced brightly and did alittle jump which Kiba noticed.  
"That was quick." He stated crossing his arms across his chest and glancing at my completely healed arm. I shrugged.  
"I did say my only strength is my medical prowess. It took 9 years to get this good, even with my Kekkei Genkai. No matter who your trained by, a ninja needs at least 5 years of training and a year of practice to count themselves as a full medical ninja, I have more than that."  
He raised an eyebrow, "That means I'll be saving your butt in a fight or something since you focus on healing."  
I thought about it for a moment, "Yeh, probably."  
Kuranei sensei shook her head slowly, "You will all grow strong in time with training. Your speed, accuracy, stamina and discipline will all increase over the next few months." All 4 of us nodded at her. "With what time we have left of today we will work on stamina."  
I grimaced.  
"I would like 15 laps around the hidden leaf village, and then you can all go home. I don't want any cheating, no short cuts as that will do nothing for improving your discipline and you will be punished." Sensei explained and we all nodded, although abit reluctantly, especially on Kiba and my part.  
Sensei pointed to the way that all of us had walked up to the top of the Hokage faces, "Off you all go. I'll know if you attempt cheating up I feel that you lot are better than that."  
"Yes Kuranei sensei!" We announced and began running.  
I was an amazing medical ninja, I'll boast about that and be proud of that, however I was low on endurance or stamina or whatever you want to call it, so I feel like this physical training if really going to take me out of my comfort zone.  
(--+-- Timeskip, about 2 hours --+--)  
"Running sucks." I announced breathing hard and labored. My legs felt they were recovering from pins and needles, I knew they were there but they didn't respond in a way that felt right, like they were numb and burning. Kiba, Shino and Hinata had left about a minute ago after we had all finished our laps and retrieved out lunchboxes, which took much longer than we had anticipated.  
I sighed and breathed in heavily to try and get some cool air into my lungs, walking was more effort than it had ever been in my life but I still planned to go to the shops. I rationalized my thoughts by remembering that I could have a long soak in the bath tonight which would help with the pain.  
The walk to the shops seemed longer than usual but eventually I made it to the shop that I wanted to buy stuff from, a ninja supply shop.  
The door opened with a chime from a bell and I walked in to face the rows of ninja tools and equipment. The shop boasted everything from, kunai, shurikan, ninja thread, food pills, swords, other forms of weapons and of course medical equipment. There was a promotion on shurikan so I bought some of them, some new kunai, ninja wire and paper bombs. The medical kit on the otherhand was the big spender, I chose quite literally the most advanced one that the shop owned, in it was everything that I would need from bandages to a how-to-make-your-own-food-pill kit, I mean everything.  
I bought my bag of sweetness and slowly began to leave the store on tired limbs, my wallet feeling quite lighter. As I was leaving I noticed a note in the kunai display case it read:  
'500 ryo for any engraving on kunai hilt.'  
I smiled and pulled out one of my purchased kunai and the desired money before placing them both on the shopkeepers counter. "Can I have the word 'sloth' put on this one please!" I asked smiling widely. The shopkeeper just nodded as I grinned madly.


	6. Chapter 6 - It All Started with a trip to the Hospital

"You had to didn't you?"  
I nodded as Shikamaru looked up at me from the kunai I had placed in his hand as a present, "It was either 'sloth', ‘sleep’ or 'Shika' so I chose the lesser of two….three evils." I told him while he inspected the engraving.  
"It's a drag but thanks I guess."  
I collapsed on one of the cushions in the living room and tried to ignore the ache of my limbs. The bath I took that night couldn't have been more welcome, I spent the better part of 2 hours lying and relaxing in the water. At least until Yoshino banged on the door and told me that other people needed to use the bathroom too. The rest of the night was taken up with dinner and me sitting on the Nara's roof with a flask of tea and a blanket reading a medical textbook.  
That was how the next few weeks went, training during the day and resting at night. Afew days after training began, Kuranei sensei had taken me to the leaf village hospital so that I could gain a placement for healing and practicing my medical Ninjutsu. And that was how those weeks went:  
Morning = Regular training (cardio, strength, Taijutsu, Genjutsu, skills improvement, sparring, Ninjutsu, e.c.t)  
Lunch = Break.  
Afternoon = Medical practice at hospital  
Evening = Whatever I liked  
It had been hard to say the least, the bruises and cuts and aching would making getting up in the morning difficult. I had noticed that I slept alot at home, more than I used to due to exhaustion from training. I had passed out afew times in training due to my lack of stamina to my shame. I'd wake up every time to Hinata's worried face and Kiba laughing at me while Shino stood to the side, not saying anything. On the bright side I'd become alot closer to Hinata during the time that we were training too, she was just impossible not to like. She'd even helped me start to learn how to cook, that had been eventful.  
One thing I had found when we trained was that I still had difficulty drawing blood from myself so I tricked others into doing it or allowed Kiba or Shino to do it when we spared, this way it would confuse and enemy in a fight which would be a good thing. Additionally I also had a regular appointment with a middle aged women named Sen Yumi who had known my father and wished for me to be her private medical consultant, she was even willing to pay. Apparently she was going to spread the word so I could get properly involved in the medical profession with private clients like my aunt, which was amazing.  
But back to the cooking.  
"Are you sure I'm cooking this right?" I asked looking down at the miso soup in the pot that was resting over the stove with an eyebrow raised. Hinata came over and stuck a small spoon into my pot and brought out some of the pale brown liquid before taking a small sip. After a moment she replied.  
"I...it's okay Tsukina, but it could use alittle salt." I nodded and looked around at Hinata's kitchen before hearing the gentle slamming of a cupboard. I turned my head and saw Hinata holding a shaker of salt in both of her hands and smiling shyly at me, "Here you go. But don't use too much or it may ruin the soup."  
I took the salt and turned back to my soup, "Thank you Hinata. That’s kind of you." I turned the shaker on its side and watched in horror as the metal lid fell off and the fine white grains fell in a waterfall into my miso soup, "Nooooo, Not fair, not fair. This sucks!"  
Yeah. That was like my first attempt at cooking, I had however gotten much better at cooking since then due to Hinata's guidance. In all things seemed to be going well. I had even visited the old apartments that my family used for foreign guest Shinobi that were not envoys/ambassadors, Kages or feudal lords. The Hokage had taken up management of those responsibilities as when my parents died I was considered too young to take control of them myself. Unfortunately they were not in the best of conditions as they hadn't been cleaned to my family's standards in a rather long time. Would probably have to do something about that sometime.  
The most eventful thing that had happen in the past several weeks was the mission that had been given to team 7: Naruto, Sasuke and Sakura. The three of them along with their sensei, Kakashi, had been given an escort mission to the land of waves and were gone for almost 2 full weeks. When they came back all of these crazy rumors followed them and said something like Naruto was able to take out one of the 7 ninja swordsmen. I remember I gaped when I heard that but wasn't able to find out if it was true or not. Since then all 3 of our Genin teams had been doing D-rank chores missions. I didn't mind too much though since of many of them it gave the opportunity to practice my cleaning and organisation, things I was getting quite good at.  
\--+--(Present time)--+--  
"That’s good Kiba, Akamaru."  
I flipped out of the way, narrowly avoiding being hit by Kiba/Akamaru as they attempted to get me with their 'All 4's Man beast clone' technique which involved Akamaru temporarily transforming into a clone of Kiba’s. As I flipped backward for the 3rd time in succession I stumbled and fell onto my butt. I had no time to defend myself but was lucky as a hoard of small black beetles came to my defense and formed a shield infront of me. Taking the opportunity to roll backwards onto my feet and backflip away and make my way over to Shino who was my partner for this current sparing exercise. Kiba was paired with Hinata who stood alittle way behind Kiba, Kuranei-sensei watched us and commented on us while we practiced.  
"Be careful when you do your flips Kina that you don't fall over."  
I nodded while Kiba or Akamaru launched themselves into the space between where Shino and I were standing beside one another. Nodding at one another Shino and I jumped apart but not as I felt something clip me on my upper arm as a clone made its way past us and a Sharpe pain erupted on my arm. Taking this opportunity I made the appropriate hand sign as I landed on the ground and activated my jutsu.  
"Blood manipulation jutsu."  
I watched as Kiba's clones both advanced towards Shino and his bugs. Sensing a presence behind me I jumped into the air and felt myself swing into a nearby tree, just narrowly avoiding Hinata's gentle fist technique. I grimaced, the gentle palm technique would often block my chakra points which would limit the flow of chakra into my blood and render my blood manipulation technique almost useless.  
Green eyes met silver and I jumped out of the tree and engaged in sparing with Hinata 1-on-1. Hinata certainly wasn't a ferocious fighter but seeing as a passing blow was all that was needed to stop my jutsu it was surprising fair. Hinata kept aiming for the chakra points in my arms as I was using those points to control my blood, but I would dodge or use my blood as a small shield to protect the areas that she was aiming for. As Hinata's second arm came round in a strike I noticed my blood could not protect me so I quickly raised a leg to take the impact feeling the impact on my chakra network as a small blast of Hinata's chakra was forced into my leg. It was a very odd feeling. I clenched my teeth and lowered my leg and bought my blood under Hinata's arm and forced it upwards giving me an opening to her side. As I hit her I felt the exhaustion she was attempting to hide, it was a very intense training exercise after all.  
Almost as if reading my mind I heard Sensei call out to us, "Okay all of you. That’s enough for now, take a break and let Kina see to any injuries you may have before she leaves for the hospital."  
Hinata and I broke our stances and we looked over to see Shino's bugs disappearing and Akamaru returning back to normal. Kiba was panting hard but perked up immediately, "What do you mean injuries. I'm way too strong for something like that." Akamaru barked in aprovement. I sighed and sat down on a random rock in our training field. Gritting my teeth I channeled my chakra into the palm of my hand and began to heal the cut on my arm. After about a minute it was done.  
'What? I heal myself quickly.'  
"Okay, who’s next?" I asked and Shino walked over next to me and sat down on the rock beside me. I noticed a small gaze on the back of his hand, He held it out and I got to work, it took about a minute or so to heal that.  
Kiba was next with several scrapes, I sighed. It took about 6-7 minutes to heal all of them. He left with a laugh. Hinata was last but she didn't actually need any healing, running a quick diagnostic I realised that she just needed an energy food pill. I gave her one from my ninja pouch which she ate.  
I then said a quick goodbye to my squad and then Kuranei-sensei. Who told me, "Your Taijutsu skills have improved drastically, and your acrobatics are a good asset to have and your ability to control your blood jutsu have also improved. However your defenses are often clumsy and can leave you open so I want you to work on that next." I nodded.  
"Thank you sensei. If you will excuse me I have to go to the hospital for training."  
Kuranei-sensei excused me and I left the training grounds before heading on my way. The walk to hospital from my training ground was a fair one, however it could be much worse that’s all I'll say. I was walking for about 3-4 minutes before I heard a feint rumbling, as I kept walking I noticed that the rumbling sounded eerily like pounding footsteps and as time passed the footsteps got much louder. Not being able to take it anymore I turned my head around looking of the source of the rabid footsteps. They kept getting louder and louder.  
"KINA RUN!" A familiar voice shouted out as I turned.  
"Naruto wha..."  
Any further words were cut off as I felt someone grab my arm and pull me in the direction that they were running. "Naruto what are we running from?" Somehow I found myself running along with him too. There was another boy who looked to be running for his life along with Naruto and apparently me too now. I was sure I'd met him once before, his name was Konohamaru.  
"Sa...kura!" Naruto exclaimed through breaths and sure enough as I turned my head slightly the unmistakable pink and red flash was right on our tails.  
"Ha!" I laughed and felt Naruto let go of my arm, I didn't stop running however, this looked like it could be fun. I had been a while since I had been in a good chase. It had also been a while since I had stent any time by Naruto. Every muscle moved as fast as it could, lactic acid steaming through my body as oxygen tried to reach every part of my being that needed it. The burning was good, even better after today’s physical training.  
We turned a corner and I looked back, Sakura's angry face really was someth....  
"Oooof!"  
Everyone stopped running and I turned my head to see what had caused the sudden interruption. Konahamaru was lying upright on the floor, he appeared to have fallen. And judging by the two figures infront of him he seemed to have crashed into one of them. Two unidentified ninja were standing before us. I'd never seen them before and they looked rather out of place.  
There was a girl who was looking down and glaring at Konahamaru, she had teal eyes and blonde hair tied up in 4 pig tails that framed her face, bangs also reached down to almost over her eyes. She was wearing a light purple, almost whiteish top dress that resembled a kimono, it was lose and was tied around the waist with a red sash. She was also wearing a grey leg covering that reached around mid-thigh. She wore fishnet coverings on the bottom of both legs, along with black ninja sandals. She also wore a headband around her neck like Hinata but hers was different. Instead of spouting the symbol of Konoha it was spouting the symbol of Suna, situated in the land of wind. She also carried a large narrow rectangular object on her back.  
The other guy also looked weird. He too wore black ninja sandals but instead wore a full black body suit with a hood pulled over his head, the hood appeared to resemble cat ears for some strange reason, the body suit had a circle symbol in the centre of his chest split down the middle, one side of the circle was yellow whereas the other side was red, the outfit didn't look like the most comfortable thing to wear in a desert environment. He too wore the sand village headband but he wore it across his forehead. He carried what looked like some mummy resembling thing on his back, either was it had brown spiky hair sticking out the top which was different. That wasn't the most striking thing about his appearance though, his entire face was covered in purple face paint, the pattern was very unique, I had never seen anything like it before. His eyes were also shut tight as he spoke to us.  
"Do you need something?"  
All that ran through my mind when he spoke was 'What are sand ninja doing here?"  
As I was lost in thought I didn't notice him pick up Konahamaru. The boy started squirming in the Sand villagers grasp as he was held up by the scarf hanging around his neck.  
"So, Does this hurt punk?" The male sand ninja asked as Konahamaru was suspended infront of the ninja's face. I noticed that the female sand ninja looked around the path we were all on before turning back to the boy.  
"Put him down Kankuro, or you know you'll pay for it later."  
Her words made me curious but my thoughts were interrupted by Naruto's yelling, "You better take your hands off of him right NOW!"  
The boy ignored Naruto's words and seemed to direct his next sentence to the girl next to him, "We've got afew minutes before he gets here so let’s mess with these punks, Huh?" I narrowed my eyes as Konohamaru started kicking out at the sand ninja but he just smirked, "You’re feisty. But not for long?"  
I could see Naruto shaking and felt his irritation. I had some of my own after all. I began to reach over to place a hand on the blonde boys shoulder but he suddenly started towards the two sand ninja and Konahamaru.  
"PUT HIM DOWN!!!" Naruto yelled at the boy named Kankuro in a very impulsive dash. I didn't even have the time to attempt to pull him back before he ran off. As Naruto began to close the gap between himself and the ninja the sand ninja boy opened his eyes and began to move the fingers of his right hand. My eyes widened as his actions seemed to effect Naruto's balance and the next thing I knew he was falling onto the floor yelling.  
"What the....what was that?"  
Taking my opportunity I grabbed a kunai from my pouch and as fast as I could cleared the distance between me and the male sand ninja before jumping behind him and holding my kunai to his throat. It was rather difficult with the boy's bandaged contraption on his back but I managed to stand my ground.  
"Let’s not do anything rash shall we, so put the boy down and we can end this without blood." I said into the boy’s ear and could hear sounds of surprise from Naruto and Sakura away behind us. The smaller children who must be friends with Konahamaru were calling his name. The female sand ninja just raised an eyebrow but didn't really do anything.  
However, the sand ninja boy just sounded smug even with a blade pressed to his throat.  
"You can't be stupid enough to really do it. The sand's alliance with the leaf aside you'd be spilling the blood of a shinobi entering your village on peaceful terms, I don't think you'd want to face the repercussions of an international incident such as that." I knew he was right. If Sand Shinobi were here than they would be here on peaceful terms. If I did injure the guy or kill him then....well I didn't really want to think about the consequences. "Now listen here. I don't like runts or any other scrawny weaklings. So when a whimp like this starts shooting of his mouth, I just wanna break him in half."  
I narrowed my eyes and pressed the blade lightly into the boy’s neck before.......suddenly seeing a very fast moving object and falling to the floor with a thud.  
I could hear a cry of pain from Konahamaru and could feel my own pain from having landed on my butt on the pavement with my back up against a wooden fence on the left side of the path. I groaned and opened my eyes to see the Kankuro boy groaning slightly and holding his right hand. This jolt must have been what caused me to fall over when he reacted. I looked over and saw a small rock on the middle of the tiled path still skidding across the floor and figured that must have hit the sand ninja's hand.  
"You’re a long way from home and your way out of your league."  
Wait a second. I know that voice!  
I looked up to see the one and only Sasuke Uchiha casually sitting up in an oak tree, even more casually gently throwing a rock up and then catching it in his hand. Konahamaru ran back over to Naruto and his young friends while the male sand ninja was glaring up at Sasuke. I felt a sharp pain in my head as suddenly Sakura started squealing Sasuke's name.  
"Oh great. Another whimp to tick me off." The sand ninja groaned, Sasuke admittedly didn't really seem to care about his words and proceeded to crush the rock he had been throwing in his hand.  
My head hurt once again as Sakura continued squealing about how cool Sasuke was.  
'You've got to be kidding me Sakura? Shikamaru would disown (kick me out of his house) me if I ever acted that much like a fangirl, at least outwardly.'  
"Hey punk!" The sand ninja called up to Sasuke, "Get down here."  
I inwardly sighed and made a point of leaning back against the fence I had fallen next to and watching the scene unfold. To put it mildly, Sasuke did not do what the sand ninja said but instead kept staring down at him.  
"You’re the kind of pesky little snot that I hate the most, all attitude and nothing to back it up." He announced sounding irritated and reached onto his shoulder and grabbed a bandage that was hanging off of the contraption on his back. Within the second he had slung it round so that it fell off of his back and onto the ground. The female ninja seemed taken aback by the action.  
"What you’re going to use the crow for this?" She asked incredulously and made a gesture as if she was trying to stop him.  
'I wonder what the crow is?' I thought to myself but had suddenly all future thoughts halted.  
"Kankuro. Back off!"  
My eyes slowly moved up the origin of the new voice. The voice was deep, monotone and really really rough. My eyes widened.  
'When the hell did he get up there?'  
It was another sand nation shinobi, going by the headband tied along a brown leather strap around his body. The new sand ninja had to have been the same age as me, unlike the other two that seemed to be a year or two older. Black ninja sandals were resting against the wooden branch of a tree on the other side of the trunk then Sasuke, but unlike Sasuke the new shinobi was standing upside down from the tree clearly using his chakra for the skill. Black 3/4 length trousers and a black t-shirt clothed him, with a large brown leather harness and a narrow white sash wrapped around his body. A large pale brown gourd was attached to the guys back by the white sash. He has light blue eyes and very pale skin, dark circles surrounded his eyes and made him look slightly ill in my opinion. A kanji character was carved into the boys head but I couldn't read it. The most significant thing to me was his hair, the new sand shinobi arrival had short spiky hair but even more importantly is was RED!  
I'm sorry. I've never seen another person with red hair before so this is kind of awesome. However the two other sand shinobi did not seem to share my view of awesomeness.  
"Your an embarrassment to our village." He said, arms crossed over his chest. I could see the surprise on everyone else’s faces.  
"I...uh...Hey Gaara." Kankuro stated with surprising nervousness in his voice. I watched the new arrival with curiosity.  
'How in the world did that guy get there though, I was looking in the direction of that tree and I didn't even notice when he arrived.'  
The newcomer’s eyes trailed over to Sasuke before slowly trailing down to me, staying there for a moment before trailing back to the other sand shinobi. It was rather un-nerving.  
He continued chastising the other sand ninja, "Have you forgotten the reason that we came all the way here?"  
"I..know...I mean they challenged us." I noticed Kankuro nervously defending himself, the shinobi's previous confidence has disappeared within a second, it was certainly raising my curiosity, "They ...started the whole thing..." He continued, "...Here’s what happened..."  
"Shut up!" Kankuro's words immediately faltered, "Or I'll kill you."  
The tone of the red haired shinobi's voice was serious and I could physically feely my stomach recoiling, there was menace in his words and for some reason that made me uneasy.  
"I..Uh..right. I was totally out of line. I...I'm sorry Gaara...I was totally out of line." Kankuro began to apologize profusely, and it was clear to my ears that the menace I had heard in the sand shinobi's voice clearly meant something to the other sand shinobi he was with.  
Seemingly satisfied with Kankuro's response the red head turned towards Sasuke, "I'm sorry for any trouble he caused." As he spoke he turned his head and looked down at the place I was sitting, looking into his eyes was unsettling, a moment or so later he narrowed his eyes at me but I tried not to make my discomfort known.  
A light brown dust began to in circle the red haired ninja before engulfing him in a small storm before clearing, when the dust cleared the shinobi was standing beside the other two Suna residents. Only upon closer inspection when he materialized did I realised that the dust that had encircled the boy was not in fact dust. It was sand.  
"Lets go." He commanded to the others, "We didn't come here to play games."  
"Alright sure, I get it." Kankuro replied and began to follow the red head as he began to lead them away. The three sand ninja had barely taken four steps when Sakura shouted out to them.  
"Hold on. HEY!" Sakura ran forward as the sand shinobi halted, they didn't bother turning around though, however since they had stopped moving for the time being I assumed that they were listening. When the blonde sand village girl stated 'What?', that pretty much confirmed it.  
"I can tell from your headband that you come from the village hidden in the sand. Of course the land of wind and the land of fire are allies but no shinobi can enter another’s village without permission. So state your purpose, and it better be good!"  
The sand shinobi turned around with the girl answering to Sakura's statements. "Really?" She said bluntly, "Have you guys all been living under a rock or what? You don't know whats going on do you?" I sighed and raised my hand before pushing myself up off the ground, the female shinobi noticed and seemed to halt what she was about to say.  
"Terribly sorry for interrupting. I hope you'll excuse me but I have some things I need to point out to my fellow Konoha shinobi." I said pointing at Sakura, "May you please allow me to say them before continuing as otherwise this will bug the crap out of me." The female ninja raised an eyebrow at me before nodding. I inclined my head towards her as a sign of gratitude and lowered my hand before clearing my throat and addressing Sakura, "Sakura, please stop trying to make yourself sound cool and clever, it only has the opposite desired effect as you don't have your facts right." Sakura narrowed her eyes at me and crossed her arms across her chest.  
"What are you on about, I am right."  
"Firstly, I'd be highly disappointed if you only recognized these three as sand shinobi afew moments ago as 3 headbands will tell you wear their from instantly. Secondly and most importantly, the land of Wind and the land of Fire are not in fact allies, both countries are currently part of a binding peace treaty which allows for the purposeful travel between villages, co-ordination for various events and the occasional trade but most importantly the promise of no conflict or war between the nations or the treaty is rendered void. The two countries are on relatively good terms with each other currently but not allies, that is an entirely different political situation and one which many do not tolerate being confused. And most importantly, do you really think 3 foreign genin would be able to get this far into the hidden leaf village without being spotted by ANBU or a Jounin. Use your head." I began to speak very quickly after that, gesturing towards the female sand shinobi, "...And before you attempt to punch me and miss hitting me entirely, please continued what you were saying miss."  
The female ninja blinked at me for a moment before smirking and continuing, "As your friend said, We have permission." She told us pulling out a village pass, "Of course, we are hidden sand Genin, our home is the land of wind, and we're here for the Chunin exams. Get the picture!"  
My eyes widened slightly, 'Oh right, that makes sense.'  
Naturally there always had to be at least one person who did not understand what was being discussed, in this case it was Naruto. "The Chunin exams, whats that? Well I've never heard of any Chunin exams, Believe it!"  
The female sand ninja scoffed as she put away her village pass, "Oh, I believe it alright, that you’re totally clueless."  
before anyone else could speak, Konahamaru began to explain to Naruto what the Chunin exams were. "Hey boss, those are the exams that every Genin has to take in order to graduate to being a full on Chunin." He explained matter of factly and I nodded.  
"Couldn't have said it better myself."  
Seeming to be done with the situation altogether the red haired sand ninja began to continue walking. However once again a voice called out and stopped them from going on their way, this time however it was Sasuke whose voice was alot more refreshing than Sakura's.  
"Hey you. Identify yourself!"  
The blonde haired shinobi turned around and gestured to herself, "Do you mean me."  
"No." Was Sasuke's rather blunt reply, "Him, the guy with the gourd on his back." The taller sand shinobi seemed alittle surprised by Sasuke's words, with the boy named Kankuro turning around and peering back at Sasuke. The red head that had been addressed thankfully turned back and replied.  
"My name is Gaara of the Desert. And I'm curious about you too, and the red haired girl. Who are you?"  
I was alittle taken aback when he asked for my name too, I don't really recall doing anything noteworthy but I mentally shrugged.  
"I am Sasuke Uchiha." Sasuke introduced and I followed suit.  
"And my name is Tsukina Tanaka." I replied.  
And like usual the third person to call out did so in spectacular fashion, "Hi there, bet your dying to know my name right?!"  
The response was brutal but short and sweet from the red head named Gaara. "I couldn't care less." With that all three sand shinobi turned around and set off, disappearing in a flash. It took me about a full 7 seconds of just staring at the place where the sand shinobi had left to realize something important. In response to my own stupidity I grabbed both sides of my head and groaned.  
"Damn it. I WAS SUPPOSED TO BE GOING TO THE HOSPITAL!!!!"


	7. Chapter 7 - Random Idea

You know those moments that you have a random idea, one that just comes out of the blue and you just can't shake, like some leech stuck at your elbow, given that unlike your hand your elbow is considerably harder to shake. Yeah, one of those ideas. I just had one and this one just so happened to change the direction of my life. I don't care how often that sentence gets used in fiction novels, because that is the most accurate description of what fucking happened as a result of this idea that popped into my head all while I happened to be making my way to the hospital for a healing appointment that I was almost late for. Thankfully my excuse happened to be walking along the street with his dog as I jumped from rooftop to rooftop in order to arrive at my destination quicker. I stopped for a moment before shouting down to him.  
"Kiba!" Kiba and Akamaru looked up at me and grinned.  
"What are you doing here Kina?, I thought you had to meet someone at the hospital." Kiba shouted up to me and I winced in slight guilt.  
"Yeah, about that. Could you please run to the hospital and find as Mrs. Sen Yumi, she was my appointment, and tell her I'm very sorry but I will not be able to see her today, however I will see her at the same time tomorrow if she is available."  
Kiba looked confused for a moment but nodded, "Sure. But why can't you make it. I thought you'd be there already, you left like half an hour ago."  
"I need to speak with the Lord Hokage." I called back and began to head off again making sure to shout back, "I'll tell you why later," so that he didn't question me for too long and make me lose my confidence about approaching the Hokage. It took me about a full minute before I reached the deep red building containing the Hokage's office. The person at the gate thankfully didn't question me as I landed on the path and made my way inside the compound, as I made my way to the Hokage's office I made a mental note that there were far too many stairs in this building and that everyone that worked here must have amazing stamina. As I reached the wooden door of the Hokage's office I began to lose some of my nerve. What if he didn't approve of my wish or....   
Gulping slightly I lightly knocked on the wooden door no more than 3 times. Almost immediately I got a surprisingly welcoming, "Come in."  
Breathing out I opened the door. The Hokage was seated behind his desk, a heavy wooden one with stacks of papers lacing both sides of the room, a chair was situated in front of the desk. He was smoking a wood pipe and occasionally the smoke would spiral upwards and linger about the ceiling before mingling with the air and disappearing from my sight. I shut the door behind me and was careful not to make a loud noise when I did, thankfully I didn’t.  
As I turned around and lowered my head in a respectful bow the Third Hokage spoke to me, “This is certainly a surprise Tsukina. Is there anything I can help you with?”  
I opened my mouth to speak but no words came out, the words just stayed caught in my throat. After afew nervous attempts at speech Lord Third began to chuckle, “I didn’t bite Tsukina. There is no need to act so reserved.”  
I nodded and thankfully when I attempted words this time they did not die prematurely, however they were not the words I had originally planned to say.  
“Chuunin exams!”  
I stated bluntly and then slowly lowered my head and apologized, “Forgive me lord Hokage, I wished to speak with you about the upcoming Chuunin exams.”  
The Hokage nodded and gestured to the wooden framed chair that was placed infront of his desk, “Did Yuhi already inform you about the near Chuunin exams? That was fast the Jounin just left.”  
I shook my head, “No Kuranei-sensei has not had the chance to tell me anything. I came here after diverging from my original destination which was the leaf hospital. I know about the exams as on my way I ran into three genin from the hidden sand village and one of them explained why they were here. I got the idea of speaking to you soon after that.”  
Lord Third nodded showing that he was acknowledging my story, “Is there anything you would like me to do for you? This confrontation with the sand genin wasn’t a violent one was it?”  
Replaying the events that occurred about 10-15 minutes ago I shook my head again, “Not really Lord third. However what I wanted to discuss was the accommodation arrangements for the arriving shinobi from other nations. I know that since my parent’s deaths you and your staff have presided over this matter as I was too young to manage them myself. But as I have been made a genin recently I thought it was about time to try and take some responsibility within the village and organize the placements for the visiting shinobi given that my family still currently owns the guest apartments of the hidden leaf village and the inn section of the Tanaka estate. As I would only be overseeing the placement of these shinobi all I would be doing is monitoring the structure and safety of the buildings and organizing occasional cleaning and catering for visitors to the estate. I would like to ask that you please put me in charge of this role during the period of the Chuunin exams.” As I finished my request I lowered my head in a small bow and waited for his response. The Hokage seemed to scratch his chin as he thought over my rather longwinded request, but after a full 20 seconds he spoke.  
“I’m afraid I cannot fully honour your request Tsukina…” My face fell as I looked at him but he raised a hand before I could retort, “The Chuunin exams are an important international event for many nations but as a competitor I am unable to let you take on this amount of responsibility without any prior experience as the stress it could bring to you could affect your performance in the exams.” I nodded but the Hokage had not finished yet, “However, I will not fully deny your request.”  
I nodded and listened to him as he continued, “I am aware that you have not lived in the Tanaka family home since the death of your parents so I will allow you to host a genin team and their sensei in the inn section of the estate for the duration of the exam times on the condition that you move back into your family home during the same time period. During this time I will be able to see if you are able to adequately host foreign shinobi in your inn before giving you larger control throughout the hidden leaf village. As a host of shinobi you will have to respect boundaries between shinobi of different nations and make sure that nothing happens to disrupt relations between nations, this is why you need to build your experience. Is this an adequate compromise for now?”  
I nodded and smiled, “Yes it is. Thank you lord Hokage. I promise you I will not disappoint your trust in me.”  
Admittedly there were quite afew downsides to this idea but I didn’t voice them, for one I would have to move back into a house I haven’t been back to in almost 6 years and move out of my place at the Nara’s house. I’d also have to clean my room as it hasn’t been touched for 6 years, unlike the rest of the house which gets cleaned every 4 days by the family housemaid (I made sure the place was kept intact while I wasn’t there). And have to make sure I didn’t screw anything up or displease the foreign Shinobi that I would be hosting in the inn section of the estate.  
“Very well.” The Hokage told me nodding, “I’m pleased that you are wanting to contribute to the welfare of the hidden leaf village, you must truly possess the will of fire.”  
I didn’t quite know what to say so to that I just said the first thing that came to mind, “Thank you for your praise Lord third.” Very quickly the Hokage’s eyes drifted to the door behind me before a knock rung throughout the room. With another ‘come in’ the door opened once more.  
"Lord Third, one of the genin teams from the land of wind has arrived with their sensei." Hearing this I turned my head to see the new arrivals and my eyes landed on some recognizable faces. The new genin team that I had run into no less than 20 minutes ago was standing in the doorway behind a very tall man dressed in a standard Suna Jounin uniform, his headband covered the entirety of his head and a sweep of fabric fell across the left side of his face, his face also sported 2 red markings on his cheek, he himself was standing to the side of a leaf shinobi who was clearly escorting the sand ninja to the Hokage's office, he also wore the standard shinobi uniform. The Hokage nodded to the leaf ninja who disappeared the next second. I quickly turned my head back around hoping not to seem rude, however I still kept a selective ear out as the sand Jounin began speaking, “Lord Hokage we were instructed to meet with you. My name is Baki and I am the instructor of Suna’s main genin team.” The Hokage nodded again before gesturing for the foreign shinobi to enter this office. They all filed in, the three genin standing in a line behind their sensei.  
“Tsukina, I trust that the Tanaka estate is in a suitable condition to receive visitors.” The Hokage asked turning his head to me. I nodded in response and the Hokage continued, “Could you lease wait outside for me.” I nodded again.  
“Of course Lord Third.” As I spoke I stood from my chair and bowed my head, I stepped away from the chair and turned to head towards the door, as I walked the sand ninja Kankuro raised an eyebrow at me, the female genin was glancing at me as I passed but the smaller ninja, Gaara didn’t even spare me a glance. Not that I minded too much though.  
Closing the door behind me I made sure I was several steps away so that there was no chance that I would overhear the inside conversation before letting all my happiness out.  
“Yes Yes Yes!” I exclaimed before promptly clamping my hand over my mouth to stop myself from making too much noise, internally squealing I found myself jumping in place as a form of letting myself happiness out. Up and down, up and down for several moments and had to fight the urge to giggle into my hand, “I can’t believe he said yes.” It took me several moments to calm down and had to put effort into restraining a large smile from breaking out across my face. It was harder than I thought. I stood silently for about 2 minutes before the door to the Hokage’s office was opened and the genin Kankuro stood holding the door.  
“Your Hokage said that you can come back in now.” I nodded and walked back into the room standing in the line with the sand genin but about a meter or so to the side of them. Lord third didn’t waste any time and cut to the chase.  
“Tsukina, I trust that you have sufficient room to host these present Shinobi during the course of the Chuunin exams.”  
Abit taken aback that the shinobi that I would be housing I had already kind of been introduced too, I glanced at them surprised out of the corner of my eye, the sand ninja did not seem taken aback by this at all. Not wanting to seem like I was rethinking my offer I nodded to the Hokage.  
“Of course my Lord.”  
He seemed satisfied, “The exams will begin in a couple of days so I trust that your guests will be sufficiently provided for during the course of their stay.”  
I nodded again, “Of course.”  
“Baki.” The Sand Jounin looked up as the Hokage spoke to him, “Tsukina will provide you with lodgings and anything that you may need during the course the exams. Come to her with any problems you may have and I’m certain she will go out of her way to solve them. If you will excuse me there are more genin teams that need to be received and find lodgings for.”  
The Jounin glanced at me before nodding to the Hokage, “Yes.”  
With that word we left the Hokage’s office, as we walked outside from the building I became aware of the silence, thankfully it was broken by the sand Jounin.  
“You are a leaf village genin aren’t you?” I nodded.  
“Yes I am, my name is Tsukina Tanaka, for your sake since you are the only one that doesn’t know this already.” I paused and bowed my head and quickly apologized, “I’m sorry. I didn’t intend to sound rude.” The Jounin didn’t respond first after that, it was Kankuro.  
“You didn’t mention…before did you?”  
I shook my head and smiled lightly, “No I didn’t mention that run in. I didn’t know I would host you when I went to the Hokage, it’s a complete coincidence.”  
“Run in?” The Jounin asked and suddenly seemed slightly worried. Kankuro seemed to slightly flinch and the female ninja looked away slightly, the small red head just kept staring forward. I nodded and lied.  
“Yes, I gave directions to a main street while I was on my way to the medical centre. Nothing of note. Although I didn’t receive a formal introduction, would you mind giving one now?” I asked and the Jounin nodded seeming to believe my lie. The two older looking genin seemed to let out alittle relief. I’m guessing that they wouldn’t want their sensei finding out about our first encounter…. and given that the boy they had been threatening was the Hokage’s grandson that information was possibly better left untold.  
The female sand ninja was the one to speak first. I found it appropriate since out of the three genin she had been the only one whose name I had not found out already.  
"Well I'm Temari from the hidden sand village, as you could probably guess by now,"  
I nodded, "It's a pleasure to meet you Temari."  
"Kankuro." The face painted boy stated to me and grinned, "Of the desert." I nodded once again and then the red head spoke,  
"Gaara, of the desert." He said and I also nodded and turned to face their Jounin.  
"I'm Baki, the Jounin supervisor of this genin team." I gave one final nod as we turned around a street corner.  
"It's nice to meet all of you." I said as we all passed a collection of market venders along the current street. People would occasionally look up and glance at us as we passed but their glances did not last long. If my gaze caught anyone’s as I walked I gave them a small smile and walked on. After a minute or so of walking in silence we began to leave the main bustle of the village centre only to run into Ino who walked out from behind a building as I walked closer to it. She smiled and waved at me when she saw me, her clear blue eyes lighting up. I waved back and she ran up to me and my entourage.  
"Kina, have you found out about the Chuunin exams, they're to be held next week, in 7 days." I nodded as she looked over at the collection of ninja behind me and her expression reached one of light confusion, "Oh, hello." She said to them and I felt compelled to intervene before she embarrassed herself.  
"Oh Ino, these are some of the sand ninja that have arrived in order to participate in the Chuunin exams. I'm currently taking them to the Tanaka inn where they will be housed for the duration of the exam period. The Lord Hokage has entrusted me with hosting them for this time." I said to her and her eyes widened and her eyes darted between them and me before she spoke again.  
"You’re going to live there again? Are you sure you want to go back home? Isn't deciding to live there again rather sudden and drastic?" She kept on, saying question after question. I sighed and placed a hand on her hand and she quieted down.  
"Don't get so flustered Ino." I told her, "It is unbecoming of one of the most beautiful girls in the village. I'll explain everything to you another time but I'm being rude by speaking to you now. I have other priorities that need to be focused on now. Please?" She nodded to me and I let go of her hand.  
"Nice to meet you. I'm sorry for being rude." Ino said quickly to the 4 sand ninja before turning and lightly jogging away. I turned to the sand ninja.  
"I'm terribly sorry for my rudeness. Please forgive my distraction." I said bowing slightly before Temari was the one to speak ahead of her sensei once more.  
"It's cool. How much further until we reach this inn place anyway?" She asked as we continued walking.  
"Oh about another 5 minutes or so. It's away from the bustle of the village centre without being too distant from any main attractions or services."  
She nodded and we reached the manor without any further interruptions. The stone path that lead to the main entrance also encircled around the building which was in turn surrounded by vast grounds. The house was incredibly large and styled in a traditional style. The front door however was a medium sized deep red double door.  
Kankuro whistled as we walked down the light coloured stone path, "Impressive, this belongs to you?"  
"Yes it does, and you for the Chuunin exams period." I said as we walked down the path. When we reached the door it opened when I pulled down on the handle even though I had no keys.  
'I guess she's in cleaning then.' I thought to myself as I held the door open and let the 4 foreign shinobi into the manor before I walked in and closed the door myself.  
I looked around the first room that I had found myself standing in for the first time in 5 years. The entrance was a decent size, dark wooden floors covered the entire area, the walls were a plain white colour but several ornamental throws covered the walls along with various artworks. A couple of dark wood display tables were resting against the wall on several parts of the room with vases filled with flowers, a sword and several other ornaments along with a couple of deep maroon couches positioned around the room. The most prominent feature however was the large staircase that was situated slightly to the left of the room. Unbeknownst to the sand shinobi another level rested above that one so officially the manor had 3 main levels.  
'It's certainly been a while huh?'  
"Well this is the lobby/entrance of the building. If you would like I can show you to the section of the estate that you will be staying in?" I said and their instructor Baki nodded.  
"I guess so. This is a large building. How many people does it usually accommodate?" He asked as I pointed to the staircase and gestured from them to follow me up it. They complied, as we walked up the stairs I kept my gaze focused on the floor as much as possible not wanting to look around at the home which I had not lived in for 6 years.   
"Well it could have accommodated my entire family and about 8 others on the floor above this which is exclusive to my family alone, but in the inn floor of the building which is the second floor it can cater for about 40-50 people including leisure areas, an entertainment room and full washing facilities, a gym or two. So the building could overall house about 70 people easily and about 85 if we pushed extra beds into rooms to make extra sleeping quarters." I explained relaying the information that my mother had explained to me countless times before she died. When we reached the top of the stairs I figured that I could afford to house them in the slightly more luxurious rooms as they would be the only people here besides me. I took a right turn at the top of the stairs and they followed me we walked along one slightly short corridor before taking an abrupt left. The decoration in this part of the inn was slightly simpler than in the lobby with less artwork and more wall hangings, doors with number plates littered the halls but I paid them no mind. A large window was situated in the wall at the end of the hall taking up the entire face of the wall. To the right wall at the end near the window was a wooden door with the kanji for 'female' engraved into the door, an identical door was positioned opposite it with the kanji for 'male' engraved into it.  
I went to the left door first sensing a familiar presence along the left corridor in one of the rooms.  
"We can sort out the male rooms first since there’s more of you." I said to all of them and opened the door with the male graving on it.  
As I opened the door I let all 4 of them enter before I left the door open behind me. As I scanned around the 8 doors in the corridor I noticed the second one on the right had the presence in it. From what I could guess the others noticed aswell given how Gaara seemed to be glaring at the door. I figured that the room would be a good place to start.  
"Baki, this one would work best as your room." I said and placed my hand on the handle of room 2213, not hesitating I opened it and my gaze landed on the figure laying out a bed sheet across the large double bed.  
She was a women of 56, with mostly grey hair tied in a neat and orderly bun, her clothes were plain and neat too with a white apron tied around herself. Upon hearing the door open she turned around and stared at the 5 people occupating the door. Her eyes were a light blue and held pure shock at our arrival. This women was Gachi Fukazawa, she had worked for the Tanaka clan since she was 23 when my grandfather was still the head of the family. After the deaths of my family she had stayed on working here to clean and maintain the building while awaiting my return.  
"Hello Gachi." I said to her giving a nervous wave which matched the tone of my voice, "I've come back home.......finally..." My voice faltered as she slowly began to walk towards me. "I'm sorry it took me so long to come back, you must have gotten sick of cleaning the entire estate every week."  
All further words were finished as I felt her slightly wrinkled fingers brush the skin of my face and when she spoke the only words I heard in her voice were ones of relief.  
"I've waited 6 years for you to return home Lady Tsukina. I'm happy you've finally come back."  
I nodded, "Yes. I'm home Gachi." Making sure that I wasn't seeming rude I made sure that I didn't ignore the sand shinobi that I was hosting, "We have guests for the duration of the Chuunin exams, this room it going to be used."  
Gachi lowered her hand and slipped back into her professional persona.  
"Of course lady Tsukina. Do you know which rooms will be used today?" She asked and I nodded.  
"Yes, I require 4 rooms and full facilities from the second section of floor 2. 3 on this corridor and 1 from across the hall. This room, room 3 is one of them. Has it been appropriately cleaned to receive visitors?" I explained and this time it was her turn to nod.  
"Only rooms 1 and 2 in this hall haven't finished being cleaned, the rest of section 2 has been finished however."  
I nodded at her information and Gachi left the room mostly likely to clean the other two rooms, I then turned to face the 4 sand ninja, "Okay then, Baki if you would like to take this room then I can take a note and take the others to find rooms for everyone else."  
"I understand." He said while I gestured for the 3 genin to head back out into the hallway, they did. As I shut the door behind us I sighed.  
"I wanted to speak with the three of you before you mentioned anything to your sensei." I told them and took a couple of steps away from the door of room 2213. Temari raised an eyebrow at me and leaned up against a wall.  
"What about?" Kankuro asked me sporting a slightly curious expression whereas Gaara's expression didn't change.  
"I wouldn't mention what happened when we ran into each other earlier. It wouldn't be wise for 3 shinobi arrive in another village on peace terms and threaten the Hokage's own blood to become public knowledge. Our leader is quite fond of his grandson afterall."  
Kankuro gulped slightly, afterall he had been the one to originally threaten Konohamaru, "That was the Hokage's grandson?" He said with a hint of nervousness in his voice.  
I nodded, "Yep. I won't say anything as it's beneficial for there to be as little friction between the nations as possible, however it will benefit you not to mention it to anyone also."  
Temari and Kankuro exchanged a look and then nodded.  
"Fair enough. We can agree to that." Kankuro said before facing Gaara, the boy with the bags under his eyes just stared forward before uttering a single word.  
"Fine."  
I nodded and smiled, "Okay then. Now that that’s out of the way you boys can choose any of the rooms on this corridor that you would like." As I spoke I gestured with my arm along the corridor.  
"Very much obliged." Kankuro stated and chose a room on the opposite side of the room from their sensei one door down, Room 2216. He jerked his thumb at the door to the room and grinned, "I'll take this one."  
Gaara walked straight past both Temari and me before completely ignoring Kankuro and walking right to the end of the hall and going for the furthest away room on the right side, two doors down from Kankuro, Room 2211b  
'Well those two certainly know how to spread themselves out along a corridor.'  
"Okay!" I said cheerfully, "You both can go in and have a look around. Please be back out within a few moments as then I can give all 4 of you a tour of the building and lay out the rules."  
"Rules?" Temari asked me in an amused sort of way while raising an eyebrow.  
"Just the regular stuff about places that I'd prefer you all not to go. My family has its own section of the estate, and not to be rude since I don't really know you there are some places that are kind of forbidden to those without permission. Private family secrets and all. Please understand." I told her and she nodded.  
"That seems like a decent statement well enough."  
I pointed to the door which opened to the pervious corridor and began to walk towards it, "Would you like to go and choose a room for yourself. You have a whole corridor of rooms to choose from so your certain to get a great one." I said and she inclined her head in agreement.  
"Sure."  
As we walked past room 3 and 4 I poked my head into room 2 to see Gachi cleaning in it.  
"Hey Gachi could you do me a favour and please fetch the door ribbons before you finish cleaning on this corridor. I'll need them before I begin the tour. They should still be on the doors on the floor below if you haven't moved them. Also could you get me the keys for rooms 2213, 2216 and 2211b?"  
Gachi nodded at my request, "Of course Lady Tsukina. Additionally I didn't remove the ribbons on any of the doors within the building, including upstairs."  
With that I shut the door and Temari and I headed out into the sectioning corridor and through the door marked with the kanji for 'female'. When we were standing in the hallway I pointed across the hall.  
"And you have your pick of any of the 10 rooms in this corridor. Sorry if you would have preferred to stay in the same hallway as your team but I'm trying to operate in the same way that my family did when we had to host hoards more people."  
Temari walked forward to door 4 before looking around the hall. I met her eyes and she seemed to be enjoying herself slightly.  
"I'm cool, a girls got to have her privacy after all. By the way which one of these rooms is the best, like which one has the best view outside and the usual stuff like that?"  
I thought about it for a moment before replying, "If my memory serves me correctly than it would be room 2239. The one in the corner at the end of the hall to the right. All rooms on the end have the best access to the windows so the views slightly better."  
Temari seemed satisfied and walked up to the door before placing her hand on the handle and walking into it.  
"Not bad at all. These quality of these rooms isn't something to scoff at." She said loudly so I could hear her.  
"Thank you." I said and walked up to room 2239, "Gachi has been cleaning the building every 4 days for the past 6 years in case it needed to be used for housing someone. These selection of rooms are of a slightly higher quality than the area alittle ways down the hall and are usually reserved for slightly more significant guests such as officials visiting from other nations on business and negotiation, this way it's helping to improve the visitors overall experience and try and make them less biased against our nation." I explained as I pointed around the room, "I figured that since you four and I would be the only ones staying here I was free to curry as much favour as I could. You can think of me however you want for saying that but I want to take on this role in the village after the Chuunin exams so I would prefer a positive review from my first guests."  
Temari chuckled and removed the giant narrow metal rectangle from her back and placed it on her bed, "Well you have to do what you can to prove yourself. It's the psychological approach, much more subtle than using brute strength to get what you want. Given what you've told me I'm guessing you’re not an all-out straight forward opponent. That’s useful to know before the exams start. Am I right?"  
I smiled liking the way that the girl was thinking, taking every opportunity to get one up on those she know will be her opponent.  
I smiled and shook my head, "You’re observant, I've deduced that much about you but one of my closest friends is a certifiable genius so some of his qualities probably rubbed off on me. I'm not in the habit of spying and being invasive though. But since you don't know me I doubt that’s much use to you. However you are right, I'm not an all out fighter, I'm actually a medical ninja. That’s something most people know about me so there’s no point in trying to dissuade you."  
The blonde sand ninja started laughing, "Well from the genin in this village I've encountered so far I think we could have been housed by a worse one. You've been decently entertaining especially when you corrected that pink haired girl. Doesn't mean I trust you or anything, I don't know you and your a foreign shinobi. No offense."  
I laughed alittle and played with one of my hair pincers, "None taken, We have just met. Admittedly though, earlier I couldn't stand the idea that someone couldn't tell the difference between a peace treaty and an alliance, they have very different political meanings, I had to correct her. Besides just for feature warning she can be kind of annoying at times so bare that in mind if you encounter her."  
"Note taken."  
She said, "You said we'd get a tour of the building when will that happen?"  
"Now would be good. I still need to tell the family I've been staying with that I won't be home for a while. Also just for the record, during this tour I have the tendency to drone on for a bit. So just stop me if I talk for too long." I explained and we both headed towards the door.  
I felt exited that I finally was beginning to take on my mother’s role within the village as I walked. However there was a part of me that felt uneasy, I'd like to think that it was because I was housing 4 strangers and I had no idea what to expect from this responsibility.  
'Meh. What’s the worst that could happen?'


	8. Chapter 8 - Ribbons and SO MUCH TALKING!

"Well given that we're back in the lobby I guess we should just work our way up." I announced cheerfully. As the 5 of us walked along the first floor I pointed out areas as we passed them, "Along from here is a leisure room full of simple board games and stuff like that to entertain yourself with along with a bookshelf. I have a much grander library upstairs in the Tanaka section of the estate so anything from there has to be requested. The main kitchen is also on this floor along with the pantry and the stocks of food, although since I haven't been here in quite a while…some the food will kind of need to be bought. There’s also a gym around in case anyone wants to do indoor training or something."   
I kind of laughed nervously as we walked passed the store houses, "There are alot of rooms on the bottom floor and to be fair you can go into any one of them and I really won't care. You'll notice that almost all of the doors that you've seen have a green ribbon tied around the handle." I explained while gesturing to a door handle of one of the recreational rooms which had a light green ribbon draped and tied around the handle, "This means that you can go into the room and I wouldn't care. Basically green means all access. The store room where all the food and alcohol is kept which we passed earlier had a blue ribbon on the handle that means that you can go in there but only if you have permission from the head of the Tanaka family, which would be me now I guess."  
The 5 of us carried on back up the stairs to the second floor where the guest areas were located. As I gave them a quick tour around the second floor I explained the normal rules for the second floor.  
"Normally almost the entirety of the second floor minus a common room or something is marked with blue ribbon, this is to respect the privacy of all the guests here as no-one would really want a stranger wandering into their room unannounced. By the way in case you want to test it, the ribbons are chakra specific and need to be attuned to your chakra by me to allow you inside the rooms, otherwise the rooms lock automatically with the chakra stored inside the ribbons. It's a pain to undo the effects so please don't do it. The only way you can get past is it is buy unlocking the door with your key, that means that the door will temporarily respond to your chakra while your here until I reverse it after your stay."  
I sighed as I remember my mother getting irritated at people trying to get into the store room at night and locking the door. More than anything she had been cross about the complete lack of respect that they had shown. Being here in the same house telling everyone the same thing she had told her own guests kind of made me wish I could go back to the times when all I did was follow her around with my sister and observe her while she worked.  
I sighed as we made our way up the final flight of stairs, the ones in the main stairwell that gave access to both staircases. When we approached the top of the stairs a large door blocked any further access to the 3rd floor. The large door had a blue ribbon tied around the handle.  
"An entire floor blocked off. Seriously?" Kankuro asked skeptically and I nodded.  
"Yes actually, this floor is dedicated entirely to the members of the Tanaka clan and that fact means that you have to have my permission to enter it. But for now...." I reached down onto the door handle and took a breath before pushing opening the door, "...I'll at least let you enter it so long as you don't wonder off on your own."  
'To be honest even if I don't trust you as your foreign shinobi and I'm letting you into my family's personal section of the building I can't.....well I know that it will be easier then coming back in here alone. Having people I don't know here affords me the opportunity to keep on a mask while I'm with you and not let my emotions through.' I thought to myself solemnly.  
The moment I walked in there I felt a tiny bit uneasy. Too many happy memories flooded back which only brought the harsh breeze of grief trailing behind it. The decor of this part of the estate was much darker, the woods of the floor were a slightly darker brown and the walls of the area were a rich red colour. Many objects broke up the richness however throughout the entire expanse of the 3rd section, more tapestry’s and hangings were spaced out along the walls, my family did like to buy art, however some of these hangings depicted the abilities of Tanaka clan in strange artworks showcasing my blood manipulation ability. Some of the more graphic ones in slightly more hidden areas of the floor made me loose my appetite if I studied them in too much detail. However there was plenty of lighting on the floor to make the dark tones of the area slightly less atmospheric (AKA less creepy), my mother and I never had really been fond of the dark tones and coloring so we avoiding anything black if we could. So many times had I run along these halls in ignorant laughter when I was younger.  
"You can come in for now just so long as I know where you are." I told them and they walked in before I shut the door behind them, Baki the genin's sensei looked at me curiously out of the corner of his eye but I ignored it and didn't address it.  
I took a left turn from the 3rd floor entrance and the sand ninja all followed me, "The reason I let you up here was to show you the third type of ribbon." I partly lied to them as we crossed several rooms with blue ribbons tied on the door handle. After a couple of doors we came across one that was red. I stopped there and pointed to the door. "Rooms like these, ones that hold family secrets have a red ribbon on them. Given the content of the room as you can probably guess these rooms are forbidden for anyone except my family to enter. It's hard enough for an outsider to even get onto this floor but since you're the only 4 here I figured I'd tell you properly without cutting any corners. Attempting to enter rooms marked with a red ribbon is absolutely forbidden, those who try will not only be banished from the Tanaka estate but get brought before the Hokage. So I'd really advise not bothering to try." I told them shrugging.  
"I can't tell…are you trying to threaten us or not?" Kankuro asked with an eyebrow raised, he didn't really seem offended. If anything he seemed amused.  
I shrugged, "Not really. Whether you interpret it that way or not is your choice. I don't want to threaten anyone. I'm a medic, it's not in my nature. However, I just want to stress how important it is that you don't even try. These doors are chakra connected so even coming too close can trigger a warning but that’s just paranoia speaking. Really the only rooms with red ribbon are the family study, the room with medical/ Tanaka clan stuff that even I struggle to get into, the room my family keeps it's alcohol in, the....the family dining room, my parents old room, my sisters room and my own room. To be honest the first 2 are a village necessity, the alcohol is because that stuff is meant to be aging and is bloody expensive to replace, and the rooms of my family are for no other reason that we hold boundaries, personal space and respect for privacy very high. Even our grand library is a conditional entry ribbon so in truth we never really cared too much so long as people respected privacy." I told them and Kankuro laughed which caused Baki to glare at him.  
"Sorry sorry, I just found it funny that you would forbid people from entering the place your family keeps alcohol over your library. It makes no sense."  
I paused for a moment before agreeing, "Yeah now that you make me think about it really doesn't. It's not I'd drink it any way, it's not a healthy life choice at my age."  
I gestured back the way we came and the 4 of them got the hint and began to walk back to the floor 3 entrance. When we got there I opened the main door and they walked out, carefully I shut it again, feeling the weight of my past memories leave me although temporarily. We walked back down to the 2nd floor and I gave the male shinobi the keys to their rooms so that they could keep their privacy. When I handed them out: Baki accepted his with a basic thank you, Kankuro accepted his with a thank you and a smirk and Gaara the smallest one glared at me as I handed him his, the dark rings around his eyes made me think that maybe he was a severe insomniac but the serious of his glare made me want to squirm where I stood and begin to nervously play with one of my hair pincers…but I didn't and almost reluctantly he briskly nodded a small sign of thanks before I turned to Temari.  
"I asked Gachi to leave the key to your room on the desk in your room while we were upstairs so it should be there when you return." She thanked me and I began my last order of business before I could leave, "As for meals, seeing as I'm being made to live here again breakfast will be made in the mornings. I have no idea when seeing as I still need to figure out when I need to wake up next week. Stuff can be made by Gachi for a lunch and dinner if you want to eat here, however if you would feel better eating out in the village just let me know so there is no wastage of food in the estate. I'd prefer if anyone told me if they have any allergies so food isn't served inconsiderately. But if you eat out then I can also recommend some good restaurants in the village. Additionally I can also arrange for Gachi to give a quick clean of your rooms periodically if you desire but please tell me if you would prefer to not have her clean your rooms."  
Having said all that I turned to them one last time, "So does anyone have any allergies or would prefer for their rooms not to be cleaned during their stay?"  
"No-one has any food allergies." Baki told me and I nodded.  
"And does anyone mind if Gachi cleans their rooms during their stay?" I asked and no-one objected, "Well that makes life easier. Also I should be gone for most of every day at least until the exams start so privacy on my end shouldn't really be an issue I hope. And so with that I can leave you to do whatever you want and I'll be back here later. Finally I can stop talking."  
Baki nodded and told me that the sand ninja would find somewhere in the village to eat tonight which was helpful to me. With that I left the Tanaka house knowing that if anything were to happen then Gachi would tell me when I came back.  
I had a lot to explain to almost everyone I knew, however I knew that I would have to start with the Naras; Shikaku, Yoshino and mostly Shikamaru. They would finally be getting a break from housing me for the first time in 6 years.

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AN - A bit of an exposition chapter I’ll admit but I thought by having Tsukina give this tour is would give you all the opportunity to see the workings behind the Tanaka clan and their roles in the village, especially since Tsukina is trying to take them on and how little things in experiencing a foreign nation can subconsciously influence your opinion of the nation as a whole, that was something I wanted to keep in mind while creating Tsukina and highlight how the little things that she does can influence the opinions of others.

 

Illusions.


	9. Chapter 9 - They Took It Well

To put it mildly the Nara's took the news well. At first they seemed surprised and then worried for me going back home, but when I told them I asked the Hokage for some of my parent’s responsibilities they seemed happy for me. Although, Yoshino kept up her strict motherly concern the entire time, not that I minded though. I made a point of picking up my house keys, flask, some clothing, books and other necessities from the Nara's house so that I wouldn't be stranded at my own home.  
I then visited Sen Yumi the woman whose hospital checkup I'd missed, as soon as I told her I had met with the Hokage she didn't seem mind one bit. Kiba and Akamaru had actually gone to the hospital to tell her not to wait for me. I also managed to do her checkup at her home so I didn't have to do it the following day like I had originally suggested which was a bonus.  
I'd also gone to see Kiba to thank him for going to the hospital for me and to explain everything to him like I'd promised. He also told me where team 8 was meant to meet tomorrow morning which I was grateful for.  
I also went to see Kuranei sensei as well, she seemed surprised but then also seemed happy for me too. She additionally said she was happy to support me so long as my new responsibilities did not become a hindrance to my training, which I tried to promise that it wouldn't.  
It was rather unnerving to me that everyone I spoke to ended up feeling happy for me going back to live at the Tanaka estate, I don't know why but for some reason it made me feel like contrary to what they all seemed to believe I was not going to thrive there.  
I also managed to make it to the market and buy a whole bunch of food to last the next day or so.  
Gachi was gone by the time I came home, it was around half 5 when I made my way through the front door with my many bags. The house was silent when I arrived but then again I didn't really expect it to be bustling. When I started packing food in the kitchen for immediate/easily perishable food and the storage room I noticed a note written in Gachi's hand writing attached to the fridge. As I placed some milk on the inside of the door I read it. It simply told me that the sand shinobi had left around 5 and that Baki their Jounin had told her they would eat out tonight. I didn't mind that they had left, it had made making a meal for dinner easier.  
Yeah I was incredibly lazy and fried an egg and made a salad. Hey it's my first night, sue me!  
I ate at the kitchen table wanting to do anything but go up to the dining room to eat, once I was done I did my washing up, packed my dishes away, and went up both flights of stairs with the small number of my things that I had brought from the Nara's house. The door recognizing my chakra let me in instantly.  
I walked very slowly along the halls of my clans home, every step or so I would catch a memory of me and my sister running through the halls in play while our father tried to catch us. It made me smile alittle. When I reached the dining room I glared at it for a moment or so in sadness before stalking off to where I knew my room was located.  
You know when I mentioned feeling like things wouldn't be so easy while I was here due to how easily everyone accepted the news of me being back here. Yeah I came across an obstacle when I reached my old room. Gachi had left another note on the door, it read:  
'This room has not been cleaned in 6 years. I did what you instructed and didn't touch it for all the years that you were gone unlike every other room in the estate. You are not to sleep in this room until it has been thoroughly cleaned and aired for several days, I implore you, please do not attempt to sleep in this room. I have prepared the master bedroom for you as you are now the head of the family, I understand that staying in your parents old room may be difficult for you but this is part of your role now so it would be in your best interests to get used to doing things that may not sit with you right at first. I promise you that you will grow into it all.   
All love and respect,   
Gachi.'  
I sighed and scrunched up the note in my hand before slowly walking along with my bag of things to the room that my own parents used to sleep in.  
You may be expecting a long depressing drawl about how it will be hard to be in the same place they slept and that memories of them will haunt me, keeping me up at night and making me ill. To be fair that might happen but I won't talk about it. I don't want to linger on their deaths and have it hold me back. I'm not one of those people (at least I’d like to think so), I came back to this house with a purpose and I'm not going to let anything stop me. The fact of the matter is that I am the head of the Tanaka clan now so I should be where the head of the family sleeps. Although I need to get a new mattress at some point soon, that is essential. You may think I sound like an unfeeling git now but I'm not that either, I spent 6 years away from home grieving and trying to prepare myself for coming back. Now I'm back and that’s it. I just have to deal with it now.  
When I reached the bedroom door I took out a long breath before opening the door and stepping inside. The room was almost as I remembered it, a large wooden framed king sized bed was placed in the centre of the room, slightly elevated by a single step highlighting the bed to anyone who entered the room, an alarm clock was place on a bedside table next to it. The wall to my left wall had large window with light brown curtains tied to the side keeping the light from the slightly descending sun in the room illuminating it. I also turned on the lights for the room to add some extra light. The wall to my right had a smaller grey door which was slightly open, I knew that it lead to an on suite bathroom. To the right of the door was a walk in storage area which kept general storage along with clothing storage. I quickly placed the clothing I had with me in the cupboard. To the back of the cupboard were several cardboard boxes. It didn't take a genius to deduce that those boxes were filled with some of my parent’s things. Gachi seemed to have moved most of their things for the time that I finally came home, not that I minded, it would have been a rather emotional experience to do it myself. Next to the large window on the left side of the room was a desk and bookshelf. I dumped the remainder of my things on there. My family have always loved art and wall hangings: Two hung from either side of the door to the corridor so that they faced the bed directly. They were nice, one was of a moon lit sky above a willow tree and lake while the other was of a cherry blossom tree in it's full glory. I remembered loving these when I was younger. I noticed that the photos around the desk hadn't been moved to it was nice to see photos of my full family including Auntie Etsuko.  
To my surprise the mattress looked new, it couldn't have been more than a couple of months old especially since no-one would have slept on it.  
"I swear Gachi thought of everything." I muttered to myself fondly and thought of what to do next. I needed to write to my aunt in the hidden cloud, she had an immense right to know that I had moved back in here.  
I walked over to the desk remembering that there used to be paper and stuff in the bottom right drawer, thankfully it was still there. Moving my stuff from the desk enough that I could write (although stuffing my house keys in the pocket of my shorts) I set about writing my letter.

Dear Auntie Etsuko,  
I don't even really know where to begin when writing this letter, so much has happened in the past week or so since our last letter. As you'll properly know the Chuunin exams are due to start in the next week or so. And I guess that lead me on to my biggest piece of news, I have begun living in the Tanaka house again. I know that about now you have begun freaking out and have probably called Keigo to freak out too. Honestly I'm fine, well for now I am. I haven't been here overnight yet. But allow me to explain myself, the Lord Hokage has given me leave to host a genin team and their Jounin from Suna for the duration of the Chuunin exams period on the condition that I returned to my own house and lived there for the same duration, I'm only hosting 4 ninja in the inn section of the estate and that is all. I promise.   
The Hokage allowed me to do this as he said it would allow me to get in some practice before allowing me to take on more responsibility within the village and fulfil my roles more. Now that I have gotten that part out of the way I can talk about well anything else really. Gachi (the houses cleaner and supervisor) has put me in mum and dad's old room, their old stuff is mostly packed away in boxes and being in it....I'm okay with it I guess. Really I am. It seems strange right now but whether I like it or not I am now the head to the Tanaka family and I kind of have to get used to being in the same places that dad once was. When you think about it it's not so strange, dad had to do the same thing with his father so it's really natural progression in my mind. I'll guess I'll have to wait until tonight to see if my body will agree with my mind about sleeping here.  
I'm really excited about competing in the Chuunin exams though, it's going to be a wonderful life changing opportunity and I know that I'll gain from it.  
I mentioned hosting 4 sand shinobi in the Tanaka estate, they seem fine so far. I did only meet them today after all. Their Jounin is named Baki and seems respectable enough, I think he seems wary of me but that probably comes with the package of being housed by a 13 year old leaf ninja girl so what can I do. The genin also seem fine for now, I think that the female of the group may be the oldest. She's called Temari, she seems to be quite blunt, observant and sarcastic so I'm not really complaining, I've not clashed with her at all and I hope to keep it that way. One of the team had red hair so I've finally met someone outside of our family with red hair which is great. He hasn't really spoken much and seems to be glaring at everyone when they approach him...but I don't really want to complain. The last genin is called Kankuro and wears face paint, which is awesome, he seems quite confident and cocky. However, like the girl I could get sarcasm out of him at points. In all I could have done much worse I think.  
I've told the Nara's about my living here for now and they seemed completely fine with it so I'm not going to complain about that either. My cooking lessons are also greatly improving so I'm getting decently good, I plan to try out some of the recipes from the cook book that Keigo sent me while I have full access to my own kitchen and can cook all I want.  
Wishing both of you the best.  
Tsukina.

Having finished my letter I had to go to my father's study to find the Tanaka family seal. A circle with a moon being formed from the left side, a small circle was placed opposite it and was connected to the moon by a line which ran into the moon's centre, from the tip of the moon a single drop fell, this drop was intended to symbolize blood. This was the reason why those born with the changing gradient of hair have the 'Tsu' for moon in their names. It was part of our clan’s symbol.  
I sealed the letter after placing it in an envelope and writing the village and intended recipient on the front.  
After doing so I checked the time, it was about half 7 in the evening, writing the letter had taken longer than I thought. I sighed.  
'Might as well go and read or something.' I told myself. With that I picked up one of my medical textbooks I had brought from the Nara's house along with my blanket that I had been sure to pick up, it wasn't special, just a plain navy blanket but I used it most nights so it had gained some sentimental points. I couldn't face making any tea so I opened my window and climbed up onto the roof, it wasn't far up but being the third floor it would be a distance to fall if I was careless. I sat facing the front of the house so I could see the path to the front door. The sun was just beginning to set, the front of the house faced the west so we always got a spectacular view of the sunset. Since the back of the house faced the east the rooms at the back of the room always got the best view of the sunrise. Feeling content I opened up my textbook and began reading.   
The section of the textbook I was reading detailed internal bleeding and hemorrhaging. Dealing with internal problems such as those were a favourite of mine as it needed me to visualize the internal workings of the injured part of the body before using the blood jutsu on them to control the loose blood into forming temporary vascular pathways of blood to allow normal blood flow to continue (it also would remove the blood from any unwelcoming parts of the body where damage would be caused such as the brain, heart or lungs, then I would work from there to heal and form the actual vascular pathways and letting the blood rejoin the circulatory system or removing it from the body altogether if it was contaminated to a significant degree.)  
I'm not going to lie, long term internal injuries such as stabbings, ruptures, blood clots and hemorrhaging are my specialty. My Chiwana Kekkei Genkai was especially suited to them.  
I moved on from there about half an hour later to head injuries and brain damage that I was slightly less suited to.  
After just over an hour and a half of reading the sun had long declined and it was beginning to strain my eyes as I had not brought out an alternative light source, thankfully 4 presences gave me an excuse to stop reading.   
The four sand shinobi had come back. I sat up straighter and kept my focus on my book. I didn't want it to appear like I was watching them, even though I unintentionally was. After a couple of seconds I heard a groan and suddenly remembered something important.  
"Looks like we're locked out." Kankuro groaned and I heard him knock on the door.  
"Do you think she's still out?" Temari asked and I strangely the small one was the one to respond.  
"No she's here."  
Kankuro responded next and he seemed slightly off while speaking to Gaara for some reason, "You mean you can sense her, Gaara?" It seemed like their Jounin was letting them talk amongst themselves.  
I heard no reply and thought it would be a decent enough time to announce myself, I did have my house keys after all. Standing up with my stuff I called out below to the four of them.  
"Give me a second to come down, I was reading on the roof."  
I heard a chuckle from Kankuro who seemed to find most things amusing, "I've heard of stranger things."  
"Shut up." Said Gaara seeming bored.  
Shaking my head I made sure I was holding everything securely before letting myself step of the edge of the room. I fell a fair way before impacting with the ground, making sure to bend my knees as not to break anything. It was still quite a jump though. I landed alittle way to the left and behind the sand ninja and walked up to them with an apologetic smile.  
"Sorry I forgot to unlock the door. I forgot you guys didn't have a door key and I was going to get back in through my window so I wouldn't have needed to come back out to the front." As I came forward I pulled my keys out of my pocket and they cleared a small path so I could open the door, after unlocking it I let them go in before me before shutting the door and locking it again.  
"No-one will be leaving again right?" I asked and finally Baki spoke.  
"No, no-one will be leaving the premises tonight." He told me and I nodded.  
"Okay then that’s fine. I can lock up for the night then. Just for future reference unless you have access to your own key, I will normally lock up for the night around 9 at night. I don't want anyone getting locked out, it would make me a bad host."  
As I spoke I noticed Baki eyeing my textbook, Temari however was the one to bring it up.  
"You weren't lying when you said you were a medical ninja. Were you studying or something?"  
I nodded, "Kind of, I'm already practiced in all the stuff in this textbook but it is paramounted that you read up on skills that you’re not using all the time so that you don't forget them and screw up when dealing with a patient."  
Baki's interest seemed to be temporarily satisfied and moved his gaze away from my book, "What time will you be back here tomorrow?" he asked me and I thought for a moment.  
"Around 5 to quarter past 5. I finish up my work at the hospital at 4:45 and that’s the last of my training for the day. Unless I know I'm away for the night the front door will remain open all day until 9 until it's locked if that’s what your trying to ask."  
He nodded, "Fine."  
"That’s good then. If anyone wants some I'm going to make tea, I'll be in the kitchen if you want it." With that I gave a small bow and headed towards the kitchen, leaving the sand ninja in the lobby. When in the kitchen I placed my things on the kitchen table and set about making tea. Once I was done I poured myself a cup before downing it and pouring another. As I finished I heard a knock on the door.  
"Come in!" I called and reached into an overhead cupboard for some more cups. In came the three genin, without their sensei, "You come for tea?" I asked and Temari nodded.  
"Yeah, we are."  
"What about your sensei?" I asked as I reached for a third cup.  
"He asked if we could bring some tea up to him." Kankuro explained leaning against a wall. I didn't have a issue with that.  
"Sure I have no problem with that, just so long as it isn't spilt and he brings the cup down for breakfast tomorrow." I said and took out a final cup before pouring 4 cups. I took out a tray and placed 3 of them on the tray before taking the tray over to the table and placing it on the surface. As the three of them went to take a cup I took my own and sat down at the table. Kankuro sat down first on the opposite side of the table about a seat away to my right. Gaara sat on my opposite side to the right too but he sat a seat away from Kankuro creating a distance between the two of them. Temari watched what happened and sighed making the decision to walk around the table and sit on the same side as me, although a seat away so she sat opposite Mr. Facepaint. I wasn't really offended though. I did meet them that day.  
We all sat in silence before Kankuro seemed to nervously try and break the ice with me.  
"Sooooo, what exactly were you reading about then?" He asked pointing to my book. I looked at him and then the book before answering.  
"Internal bleeding, hemorrhaging, head injuries and different types of brain damage." I listed off and watched his reaction. It was quite amusing.  
"Geez, if you hadn't told me that you're a medic then I'd think that you’re some kind of crazy scientist."  
I smiled and took a sip of my tea, "Well I secretly could be for all you know." I joked. Causing Temari to smile alittle.  
"Just for the sake of asking, you said that you would make breakfast in the mornings. Around what time in the morning do you think that would be ready?" She asked and I had to think for a moment.  
'Well if I'm meant to meet the rest of my team at 8:30 in training field nine then I guess......'  
"I guess around 7 in the morning, I'd have to leave around 8 tomorrow and Gachi will be here from 9 to clean up. I'm going to say breakfast will be a 7. There is a guest dining room on the ground floor so you can eat in there if you want....I'll probably be in here making my lunch in case you need to find me....so yeah. 7." As I watched them digest the information I apologized, "Terribly sorry. I have a tendency to drone on a bit."  
Temari just nodded and brushed my apology aside, "You told me you can talk alot earlier but it doesn't bother me so far. I'll come in before 7 and lend a hand."  
"You cook?" I ask and drank some more tea as she replied.  
"No. But I need something to do, I'm an early riser and will needed to keep myself occupied."  
"Fair enough. I don't really care, Do whatever you want. Just don't break anything that’s all I ask." I told her and stood up from my chair before walking over to the sink and rinsing it under the tap and placing it on the dishes rack to dry, I turned to face Kankuro, "There’s a 5th cup on the counter here, once you are finished you can fill it with tea and take it up to your sensei or whatever. I'm going to go to sleep as I have to be up early to make breakfast tomorrow."  
Kankuro seemed alittle surprised, "Your going to bed it's only like 9:45?"  
I nodded, "Sorry for leaving you but I still have to bath and stuff before I go to bed and it has been a long day, I didn't expect to be sleeping here tonight so I would prefer to be well rested for tomorrow."  
Kankuro shrugged and went back to his tea. Temari spoke next, "We shouldn't be too long then we'll go up to bed too."  
As I was about to turn to leave I heard Gaara speak up for the first time since the sand shinobi had come into the kitchen.  
"Do the windows allow you to get back inside them after climbing out of them?"  
I became rather curious about the randomness of the question but answered it all the same but I certainly showed my curiosity.  
"I'm not trying to be invasive but why would you want to climb out of the window?" I asked slowly and got a very blunt answer.  
"The roof."  
"Ahh.." I responded but realised that I had gotten onto the roof to read the exact same way earlier, "Yes you certainly can get back inside the windows after climbing out of them, just make sure they don't shut while your out there as then you would be locked outside the building. I'm sorry, my family is quite strict on security......" As I spoke I remembered something important, "....This is important, someone remind me to give one of you a single key to the main door as otherwise if someone does get locked outside they have to wait for me to turn up to get them inside seeing as you can't get onto the Third floor to find me." As I was telling them this I was tapping my head in irritation that I didn't realize this earlier.  
"So to answer your question Gaara, yes, you can get back inside after climbing out your window as long as it doesn't shut and lock you outside."  
He nodded and went back to his tea.  
I sighed, "Well I'm heading to the third floor. It was nice to meet you 3 and goodnight." I told them. I got a quick 'night' from Kankuro and a nod from Temari who was in the middle of a sip of tea, Gaara glanced at me as I walked out the door but that was it.  
I briskly made my way upstairs and shut my bedroom window and drew the curtains, had a decent length bath, brushed my teeth and finally fell back into my new bed, my parent’s old one.  
"That was certainly one hell of day." I said to myself and played with one of my hair pincers. A slight rustling coming from the roof made me raise an eyebrow but mentally shrug.  
"Well he did ask about the roof." I said as I set my alarm for 5:45 in the morning. I slowly got into the bed and shivered as the bed had not adjusted to my body heat and seemed alittle chilly. Knowing it would heat up I pulled the covers up so they brushed my chin and shut my eyes. Wondering about what tomorrow would bring and letting it sink in that I was really back home.  
Home......it just didn't seem right yet.


End file.
